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Lafayette O'Leary #1
The Time Bender
(Feb 1966, Keith Laumer, publ. Berkley Medallion, #F1185, $0.50, 160pp, pb) Cover: Richard Powers
160 pages, Paperback
First published February 1, 1966
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189 people want to read
About the author
Keith Laumer
498 books225 followersJohn Keith Laumer was an American science fiction author. Prior to becoming a full-time writer, he was an officer in the U.S. Air Force and a U.S. diplomat. His brother March Laumer was also a writer, known for his adult reinterpretations of the Land of Oz (also mentioned in Keith's The Other Side of Time).
Keith Laumer (aka J.K Laumer, J. Keith Laumer) is best known for his Bolo stories and his satirical Retief series. The former chronicles the evolution of juggernaut-sized tanks that eventually become self-aware through the constant improvement resulting from centuries of intermittent warfare against various alien races. The latter deals with the adventures of a cynical spacefaring diplomat who constantly has to overcome the red-tape-infused failures of people with names like Ambassador Grossblunder. The Retief stories were greatly influenced by Laumer's earlier career in the United States Foreign Service. In an interview with Paul Walker of Luna Monthly, Laumer states "I had no shortage of iniquitous memories of the Foreign Service."
Four of his shorter works received Hugo or Nebula Award nominations (one of them, "In the Queue", received nominations for both) and his novel A Plague of Demons was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1966.
During the peak years of 1959–1971, Laumer was a prolific science fiction writer, with his novels tending to follow one of two patterns: fast-paced, straight adventures in time and space, with an emphasis on lone-wolf, latent superman protagonists, self-sacrifice and transcendence or, broad comedies, sometimes of the over-the-top variety.
In 1971, Laumer suffered a stroke while working on the novel The Ultimax Man. As a result, he was unable to write for a few years. As he explained in an interview with Charles Platt published in The Dream Makers (1987), he refused to accept the doctors' diagnosis. He came up with an alternative explanation and developed an alternative (and very painful) treatment program. Although he was unable to write in the early 1970s, he had a number of books which were in the pipeline at the time of the stroke published during that time.
In the mid-1970s, Laumer partially recovered from the stroke and resumed writing. However, the quality of his work suffered and his career declined (Piers Anthony, How Precious Was That While, 2002). In later years Laumer also reused scenarios and characters from his earlier works to create "new" books, which some critics felt was to their detriment:
Alas, Retief to the Rescue doesn't seem so much like a new Retief novel, but a kind of Cuisnart mélange of past books.
-- Somtow Sucharitkul (Washington Post, Mar 27, 1983. p. BW11)
His Bolo creations were popular enough that other authors have written standalone science-fiction novels about them.
Laumer was also a model airplane enthusiast, and published two dozen designs between 1956 and 1962 in the U.S. magazines Air Trails, Model Airplane News and Flying Models, as well as the British magazine Aero Modeler. He published one book on the subject, How to Design and Build Flying Models in 1960. His later designs were mostly gas-powered free flight planes, and had a whimsical charm with names to match, like the "Twin Lizzie" and the "Lulla-Bi". His designs are still being revisited, reinvented and built today.
Keith Laumer (aka J.K Laumer, J. Keith Laumer) is best known for his Bolo stories and his satirical Retief series. The former chronicles the evolution of juggernaut-sized tanks that eventually become self-aware through the constant improvement resulting from centuries of intermittent warfare against various alien races. The latter deals with the adventures of a cynical spacefaring diplomat who constantly has to overcome the red-tape-infused failures of people with names like Ambassador Grossblunder. The Retief stories were greatly influenced by Laumer's earlier career in the United States Foreign Service. In an interview with Paul Walker of Luna Monthly, Laumer states "I had no shortage of iniquitous memories of the Foreign Service."
Four of his shorter works received Hugo or Nebula Award nominations (one of them, "In the Queue", received nominations for both) and his novel A Plague of Demons was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1966.
During the peak years of 1959–1971, Laumer was a prolific science fiction writer, with his novels tending to follow one of two patterns: fast-paced, straight adventures in time and space, with an emphasis on lone-wolf, latent superman protagonists, self-sacrifice and transcendence or, broad comedies, sometimes of the over-the-top variety.
In 1971, Laumer suffered a stroke while working on the novel The Ultimax Man. As a result, he was unable to write for a few years. As he explained in an interview with Charles Platt published in The Dream Makers (1987), he refused to accept the doctors' diagnosis. He came up with an alternative explanation and developed an alternative (and very painful) treatment program. Although he was unable to write in the early 1970s, he had a number of books which were in the pipeline at the time of the stroke published during that time.
In the mid-1970s, Laumer partially recovered from the stroke and resumed writing. However, the quality of his work suffered and his career declined (Piers Anthony, How Precious Was That While, 2002). In later years Laumer also reused scenarios and characters from his earlier works to create "new" books, which some critics felt was to their detriment:
Alas, Retief to the Rescue doesn't seem so much like a new Retief novel, but a kind of Cuisnart mélange of past books.
-- Somtow Sucharitkul (Washington Post, Mar 27, 1983. p. BW11)
His Bolo creations were popular enough that other authors have written standalone science-fiction novels about them.
Laumer was also a model airplane enthusiast, and published two dozen designs between 1956 and 1962 in the U.S. magazines Air Trails, Model Airplane News and Flying Models, as well as the British magazine Aero Modeler. He published one book on the subject, How to Design and Build Flying Models in 1960. His later designs were mostly gas-powered free flight planes, and had a whimsical charm with names to match, like the "Twin Lizzie" and the "Lulla-Bi". His designs are still being revisited, reinvented and built today.
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews
May 1, 2017
More of a 2.5 star read. Kind of a whacky humor fantasy, but there is just too much convenience which breaks the few rules he vaguely references at times. There are a few more in this series, but I won't be reading any more.
July 29, 2021
Although I didn’t read The Time Bender, the first volume of the Lafayette O’Leary series, as my first experience with the series, I am very delighted to have discovered it. As a big fan of Keith Laumer’s Jaime Retief stories which lampoons ridiculous bureaucracy, I have found this series to simply be absurdist fun. My biggest problem with The Time Bender is that I don’t know how to classify it. It might be science-fantasy since there is an inter-dimensional element to it. There might be a science-fiction aspect since there is a time-travel element. There is a steampunk element since Artesia, the primary venue for most of the novel’s action has some steam-powered vehicles that don’t quite fit the medieval timeline to be expected in that country. But I classified this as humor because that was the overriding feeling as I read it. However, I mention the taxonomy in case someone might wonder if these books have what they might be seeking.
I wish I had read The Time Bender first, though the third volume, The Shape Changer, did make references back to this origin story when I read it. The relationship of the protagonist, O’Leary, to Red Bull, for example, would have been better understood if I had read the books in order. The relationship with Daphne, though explained in matter-of-fact terms, would have been even funnier if I had known more of the interaction from this novel. Of course, the antagonist was presumed in the third volume while the background story here very much enriches it. I read a lot of novel series volumes out of order, but this is one of the few times I feel like I missed out (though, one can tell from my review of The Shape Changer that I didn’t feel cheated, and I ordered the first two volumes immediately).
If anything, The Time Bender is funnier than the third volume. Laumer didn’t use any faux-linguistics in this one (as he did in places in the third novel and as was a staple in the alien languages used in the Retief stories), but the rationale for this becomes clear as the exposition concerning Artesia and Lafayette’s attraction to it is revealed. Plus, there is still plenty of comedy involved in the cultural disconnect as O’Leary becomes acculturated to Artesia and aware of the story arc which transcends Artesia. And, while one cannot say that the mesmerist powers displayed by O’Leary have a logical consistency to them, these spell-like abilities (to use a Dungeons & Dragons term) are not exactly magical realism (although, there is an explanation of how this works toward the end which might qualify, in a science-fiction space-time continua sense).
To be frank, I didn’t like Lafayette O’Leary from the outset (in either novel I’ve read so far) as much as I liked Retief. Retief seemed like the kind of resilient individual who was so competent and so situationally aware (or ahead-of-the-game) that he could rebound from anything. O’Leary seemed like a loser with a capital “L” in that he was more often swept from one situation to another rather than being proactive. At least, that was the set-up in both books, but The Time Bender evolves as the pace goes on, becoming more of a hero and less of a victim (even though he still seems, even in his…well…”pyrrhic” victories, to be something of a schlimazel grasping hold of just enough luck and opportunity to weasel out of one bad situation before being dragged into another.
So, O’Leary has to discover if there is a giant, a dragon, and a curse. Are they real? Is there an explanation? But the way he does discover the truth about these threats to kingdom and princess is both entertaining and satisfying. Indeed, even though much of the “derring-do” is performed on behalf of rescuing a princess, I think most readers will be pleased at what Laumer does with that trope. I have carefully bit my fingertips (in lieu of my tongue since I’m typing) to try to avoid spoilers here because this is a story where the fun is in both the desired and undesired uncovering of secrets and misunderstandings. Enjoy!
I wish I had read The Time Bender first, though the third volume, The Shape Changer, did make references back to this origin story when I read it. The relationship of the protagonist, O’Leary, to Red Bull, for example, would have been better understood if I had read the books in order. The relationship with Daphne, though explained in matter-of-fact terms, would have been even funnier if I had known more of the interaction from this novel. Of course, the antagonist was presumed in the third volume while the background story here very much enriches it. I read a lot of novel series volumes out of order, but this is one of the few times I feel like I missed out (though, one can tell from my review of The Shape Changer that I didn’t feel cheated, and I ordered the first two volumes immediately).
If anything, The Time Bender is funnier than the third volume. Laumer didn’t use any faux-linguistics in this one (as he did in places in the third novel and as was a staple in the alien languages used in the Retief stories), but the rationale for this becomes clear as the exposition concerning Artesia and Lafayette’s attraction to it is revealed. Plus, there is still plenty of comedy involved in the cultural disconnect as O’Leary becomes acculturated to Artesia and aware of the story arc which transcends Artesia. And, while one cannot say that the mesmerist powers displayed by O’Leary have a logical consistency to them, these spell-like abilities (to use a Dungeons & Dragons term) are not exactly magical realism (although, there is an explanation of how this works toward the end which might qualify, in a science-fiction space-time continua sense).
To be frank, I didn’t like Lafayette O’Leary from the outset (in either novel I’ve read so far) as much as I liked Retief. Retief seemed like the kind of resilient individual who was so competent and so situationally aware (or ahead-of-the-game) that he could rebound from anything. O’Leary seemed like a loser with a capital “L” in that he was more often swept from one situation to another rather than being proactive. At least, that was the set-up in both books, but The Time Bender evolves as the pace goes on, becoming more of a hero and less of a victim (even though he still seems, even in his…well…”pyrrhic” victories, to be something of a schlimazel grasping hold of just enough luck and opportunity to weasel out of one bad situation before being dragged into another.
So, O’Leary has to discover if there is a giant, a dragon, and a curse. Are they real? Is there an explanation? But the way he does discover the truth about these threats to kingdom and princess is both entertaining and satisfying. Indeed, even though much of the “derring-do” is performed on behalf of rescuing a princess, I think most readers will be pleased at what Laumer does with that trope. I have carefully bit my fingertips (in lieu of my tongue since I’m typing) to try to avoid spoilers here because this is a story where the fun is in both the desired and undesired uncovering of secrets and misunderstandings. Enjoy!
April 1, 2015
Lafayette O'Leary is a draftsman living a boring life -- until he's catapulted (well, falls) into a fantastic world that is a mix of Medieval weapons and technology with touches of modern amenities, such as electric lights and coffee. Oh, and there's a beautiful princess too.
Sound like fun? Well, add Keith Laumer's sardonic writing style and you have a story that can't fail to be entertaining. O'Leary is more than he thought he was and stumbles from one encounter to another thinking he's only dreaming -- but he survives anyway.
Great "escapist" story that was thoroughly entertaining. It leads to a series of which I've read one (which was less than satisfying -- probably because I didn't read this one first). However, this story is complete by itself, so you don't have to worry about a "cliff-hanger".
Sound like fun? Well, add Keith Laumer's sardonic writing style and you have a story that can't fail to be entertaining. O'Leary is more than he thought he was and stumbles from one encounter to another thinking he's only dreaming -- but he survives anyway.
Great "escapist" story that was thoroughly entertaining. It leads to a series of which I've read one (which was less than satisfying -- probably because I didn't read this one first). However, this story is complete by itself, so you don't have to worry about a "cliff-hanger".
February 20, 2021
Lafayette O’Leary’s life is not exactly going well. He’s an underpaid draftsman at a small town foundry, whose diet consists largely of sardines and the cheapest grade of taffy. His entertainment is books from the library, viewed with suspicion by his nosy landlady and sponging neighbor. Tonight, his reading is a thick scholarly tome about self-hypnosis, which Lafayette hopes will give him more vivid dreams.
So when Lafayette finds himself transported to the anachronistic kingdom of Artesia, he initially assumes he’s just in a very elaborate lucid dream. This view is bolstered by Lafayette having some reality-bending powers that come off to the locals as sorcery. But the people of Artesia are not reacting well to being told this is just a dream. Our protagonist is hauled before the king, and only the possibility that he might be the Chosen One who will slay the dragon and defeat the ogre Lod gives him any chance of survival.
That is, until Princess Adoranne vanishes, and Lafayette O’Leary becomes the top suspect!
While I, like many anime fans, like to make jokes at the expense of the ever-expanding number of isekai (other world) stories, they have a long tradition in fiction. And this tale is a worthy ancestor of that subgenre. Seemingly ordinary schlub is transplanted to world that’s reminiscent of Late Middle Ages Europe, but with anachronistic bits and fantasy elements. He gains awesome but sometimes hard to control powers and is revealed as the Chosen One. Attractive women find him sexy for no good reason, and start falling in love with him because he’s nice to them. He also develops a habit of accidentally walking in on underclad women. He’s also much better at combat than you’d expect for his non-action backstory.
Lafayette is, despite bursts of combat skill, more of a guile hero. He’s introduced using his verbal wit to intimidate the landlady, and often uses his wits and sneakiness to advantage. This is offset by him making some assumptions early on that are reasonable in context but dead wrong. (It’s not a dream, and the locals aren’t just making up this alleged dragon.) This sours his relationships with some characters who he could have used support from later.
Our hero’s powers do have an explanation, and vaguely defined but present limits, so as often as they get him out of trouble, they get him into trouble or are not currently available.
The writing is breezy and mostly humorous. The romance element is kind of forced, and tied off perhaps a little too neatly at the end.
Content note: Early on, Lafayette “edits” a couple of people without their consent. He’s still in his “this is a dream” mode, but still, super creepy in a way the author probably didn’t intend, and audiences in 1964 when this was written would have understood that one of the edits was to inflict a stereotype associated with homosexual men at the time.
Overall, a fun book that you probably shouldn’t think about too hard. It did well enough to spawn three sequels. Recommended to isekai fans.
So when Lafayette finds himself transported to the anachronistic kingdom of Artesia, he initially assumes he’s just in a very elaborate lucid dream. This view is bolstered by Lafayette having some reality-bending powers that come off to the locals as sorcery. But the people of Artesia are not reacting well to being told this is just a dream. Our protagonist is hauled before the king, and only the possibility that he might be the Chosen One who will slay the dragon and defeat the ogre Lod gives him any chance of survival.
That is, until Princess Adoranne vanishes, and Lafayette O’Leary becomes the top suspect!
While I, like many anime fans, like to make jokes at the expense of the ever-expanding number of isekai (other world) stories, they have a long tradition in fiction. And this tale is a worthy ancestor of that subgenre. Seemingly ordinary schlub is transplanted to world that’s reminiscent of Late Middle Ages Europe, but with anachronistic bits and fantasy elements. He gains awesome but sometimes hard to control powers and is revealed as the Chosen One. Attractive women find him sexy for no good reason, and start falling in love with him because he’s nice to them. He also develops a habit of accidentally walking in on underclad women. He’s also much better at combat than you’d expect for his non-action backstory.
Lafayette is, despite bursts of combat skill, more of a guile hero. He’s introduced using his verbal wit to intimidate the landlady, and often uses his wits and sneakiness to advantage. This is offset by him making some assumptions early on that are reasonable in context but dead wrong. (It’s not a dream, and the locals aren’t just making up this alleged dragon.) This sours his relationships with some characters who he could have used support from later.
Our hero’s powers do have an explanation, and vaguely defined but present limits, so as often as they get him out of trouble, they get him into trouble or are not currently available.
The writing is breezy and mostly humorous. The romance element is kind of forced, and tied off perhaps a little too neatly at the end.
Content note: Early on, Lafayette “edits” a couple of people without their consent. He’s still in his “this is a dream” mode, but still, super creepy in a way the author probably didn’t intend, and audiences in 1964 when this was written would have understood that one of the edits was to inflict a stereotype associated with homosexual men at the time.
Overall, a fun book that you probably shouldn’t think about too hard. It did well enough to spawn three sequels. Recommended to isekai fans.
August 15, 2024
After hypnotizing himself, Lafayette O'Leary finds himself in a medieval fantasy-type world alternate to our own. He quickly finds he is mistaken for the Phantom Outlaw, and has magical powers - the power to alter reality by moving things around (with great comic effect)- including from our reality (c.1971) to his new one. Getting in trouble with the authorities, he agrees to slay a dragon for them. He also encounters the reality police (a nice change to the time police of much other fiction), trying to keep all the parallel worlds from being changed by people moving between them. This is a fast-paced, light, somewhat tongue-in-cheek adventure, well-written, cleverly plotted, with everything neatly explained by the end.
April 6, 2019
So, I'm pretty late to the Laumer party. I finally got around to starting Retief and then this shot across my bow. How to describe? Wild. Chaotic. Imaginative - especially for 1966 (fantasy books were a little limited back then...) Seems I'll be splitting my diversionary fiction between the two for a while. I did wonder at the title...unrelated to the book, as it were, but regardless, this was still uh, rollicking, fun.
May 23, 2019
I usually like Keith Laumer, but I thought this was awful. Weak slapstick, with an annoying idiot having ridiculous things happening to him one after another, bleating on the whole time about how he can’t believe it. Wacky and zany are the words that spring to mind, unfortunately. It’s like an episode of Scooby Doo, and not a good one.
September 17, 2022
Solid sci-fi novel from the early 70s. Unique storyline involving alternate dimensions and travel to and fro. Our hero is likeable and I found myself pulling for him to overcome severe challenges. It was a very fun read and fairly well written.
December 15, 2018
I read Retief a few years ago and did not think to go looking for more of Keith's work... a big mistake, because his other work is just as adventurous. A very great ride of a read.
April 12, 2020
This is old school science fiction that is light on plot and heavy on action. I enjoyed it.
June 15, 2020
Finally found it used. I have several other sequels and I always wanted to read this one. It was ok, but not special.
April 11, 2023
Standard Laumer. Entertaining and fast-paced, but not brain taxing.
September 6, 2024
Not great. Skimmed the second half and read th least chapter. Eye roll of an ending.
June 26, 2013
review of
Keith Laumer's The Time Bender
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - June 26, 2013
I'm starting off writing this review w/ listening to the music of Nicolas Flagellon on Serenus Recorded Editions. He's not a favorite composer but I like these obscure academic classical labels. Uh.. where was I? Oh, yeah, Keith Laumer, my new temporary favorite SF writer - a shordurpersav in SubG lingo. Of the previous 3 bks I read by Laumer, 2 were time travel stories & one was a parallel universe travel story so there's a commonality there that borders on gimmickry but I don't care, I like the stories.
Laumer's got a way w/ language: "penicillium notatum" is actually the Latin name for a particular fungus but I 'can't help' seeing it as a pun off of 'pencil notation' at the same time.
Was self-hypnosis all the rage in the 1960s? I just read John Brunner's great 1969 The Evil That Men Do that features it & now this: "He flipped open Schimmerkopf's book at random and skimmed the print-packed pages. The sections on mesmerism were routing stuff, but a passage on autohypnosis caught his eye". (p 7) The character starts off weak & banal until he, apparently, self-hypnotizes & ends up in another time-world wch he interprets as a dream-manifestation of his own unconscious: "Adoranne gasped. "You mean the infamous cutpurse and smuggler?" / ""He seemed to have some illegal ideas, all right. A reflection of the anarchist in me, I suppose." (p 51) One of the easiest ways for a writer to receive some critical jabs from me is for them to reference anarchy in a way that I think is inaccurate & unfair. Laumer teeters here but doesn't completely fall into the traps of cliché.
Cf "finishing off a cracker with sardines—the only rations, it appeared, that Nicodaeus kept handy." (p 84) to Laumer's The Great Time Machine Hoax: ""We got no venison. Plenty canned beans and stale crackers." (pp 108-109) Is there any personal experience in there w/ poverty? For me, it was canned mackerel & canned sardines. They were cheap, one cd open the cans w/ the provided key.
The Time Bender cd be sd to owe a bit of a debt to Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court - wch I don't begrudge it. In Laumer's The Great Time Machine Hoax, the somewhat mediocre hero develops himself in a carefully detailed process. In The Time Bender, the somewhat mediocre hero displays astonishing & unlikely abilities when he's displaced from the environment we're introduced to him in. Under torture:
""How say you, starveling?" he called to O'Leary, "Do you tire of the game? Do red-hot knives of pain loosen your tongue?"
""I'm fine," O'Leary said blurrily. I like it here. It's restful."" - p 122
I reckon this is 'explained' later by some heredity-cleared-up. By p 135, some other explaining enters the heretofore confusion:
"O'Leary leaned forward to look at the badge. There was a large 7-8-6 engraved in its center on a stylized representation of what appeared to be an onion. Around the edge O'Leary spelled out:
"SUBINSPECTOR OF CONTINUA
"He frowned at the older man and lowered the ax reluctantly. "What does that mean?"" - p 135
I like writing these reviews where i barely address the plot & don't provide any easy spoilers. Let's just say that I didn't like this as much as Laumer's The Great Time Machine Hoax or The Monitors but I'm enjoying his writing so much these days that I'd recommend just about any of it.
Keith Laumer's The Time Bender
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - June 26, 2013
I'm starting off writing this review w/ listening to the music of Nicolas Flagellon on Serenus Recorded Editions. He's not a favorite composer but I like these obscure academic classical labels. Uh.. where was I? Oh, yeah, Keith Laumer, my new temporary favorite SF writer - a shordurpersav in SubG lingo. Of the previous 3 bks I read by Laumer, 2 were time travel stories & one was a parallel universe travel story so there's a commonality there that borders on gimmickry but I don't care, I like the stories.
Laumer's got a way w/ language: "penicillium notatum" is actually the Latin name for a particular fungus but I 'can't help' seeing it as a pun off of 'pencil notation' at the same time.
Was self-hypnosis all the rage in the 1960s? I just read John Brunner's great 1969 The Evil That Men Do that features it & now this: "He flipped open Schimmerkopf's book at random and skimmed the print-packed pages. The sections on mesmerism were routing stuff, but a passage on autohypnosis caught his eye". (p 7) The character starts off weak & banal until he, apparently, self-hypnotizes & ends up in another time-world wch he interprets as a dream-manifestation of his own unconscious: "Adoranne gasped. "You mean the infamous cutpurse and smuggler?" / ""He seemed to have some illegal ideas, all right. A reflection of the anarchist in me, I suppose." (p 51) One of the easiest ways for a writer to receive some critical jabs from me is for them to reference anarchy in a way that I think is inaccurate & unfair. Laumer teeters here but doesn't completely fall into the traps of cliché.
Cf "finishing off a cracker with sardines—the only rations, it appeared, that Nicodaeus kept handy." (p 84) to Laumer's The Great Time Machine Hoax: ""We got no venison. Plenty canned beans and stale crackers." (pp 108-109) Is there any personal experience in there w/ poverty? For me, it was canned mackerel & canned sardines. They were cheap, one cd open the cans w/ the provided key.
The Time Bender cd be sd to owe a bit of a debt to Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court - wch I don't begrudge it. In Laumer's The Great Time Machine Hoax, the somewhat mediocre hero develops himself in a carefully detailed process. In The Time Bender, the somewhat mediocre hero displays astonishing & unlikely abilities when he's displaced from the environment we're introduced to him in. Under torture:
""How say you, starveling?" he called to O'Leary, "Do you tire of the game? Do red-hot knives of pain loosen your tongue?"
""I'm fine," O'Leary said blurrily. I like it here. It's restful."" - p 122
I reckon this is 'explained' later by some heredity-cleared-up. By p 135, some other explaining enters the heretofore confusion:
"O'Leary leaned forward to look at the badge. There was a large 7-8-6 engraved in its center on a stylized representation of what appeared to be an onion. Around the edge O'Leary spelled out:
"SUBINSPECTOR OF CONTINUA
"He frowned at the older man and lowered the ax reluctantly. "What does that mean?"" - p 135
I like writing these reviews where i barely address the plot & don't provide any easy spoilers. Let's just say that I didn't like this as much as Laumer's The Great Time Machine Hoax or The Monitors but I'm enjoying his writing so much these days that I'd recommend just about any of it.
Read
December 12, 2011This is the first Lafayette o'Leary book.
Lafayette o'Leary is something of a rogue, truth be known. He protests that he's a victim of misunderstandings...and sometimes he is. But he sets up the conditions for the misunderstandings.
At the beginning, he's also something of a lush. It's perhaps understandable that he drinks to avoid the tedium of his original life. But the fact that, having escaped to Artesia, his first plan is to go to a tavern and get roaring drunk indicates that he can't blame it all on circumstances.
Anybody who has read older books and seen older shows will know that alcohol consumption was pretty prolific until about the early 70s, when other drugs began to seriously challenge the monopoly. But the sheer volume of drinking is astonishing in fiction from this period.
These cavils aside, o'Leary is a fairly loveable rogue. And the series has some fascinating conceits. The existence of a transdimensional secret government (which seems to mostly consist of keeping people from trying to spread their power to other dimensions--and otherwise has a strictly hands-off policy (which, like the Prime Directive from Star Trek, is indifferently observed)) acts as something of a deus ex machina--but not very much so, since they tend to manipulate natives into doing their work for them.
This is not the best book in the series. I originally sought it out and read in just in the interests of getting caught up on the background of later books. But it still has some pretty good elements, such as the Coke Machine in the desert. And it contains a pretty good description of an only slightly extraordinary guy coming to terms with unanticipated abilities, and exploring their limitations and potentials.
I won't give away the 'surprise' ending, though it's telegraphed from early on. I'll just note that the resolution is not typical of such premises.
And I'll also note that there are a lot of unresolved issues. Why SHOULD Lafayette be able to do what he can? Granted it becomes somewhat moot at the end, once the Suppressor is activated: but it's never really answered. O'Leary rejects 'magic' as the answer: but what other answer really satisfies all the conclusions? Come to that, how can he read Artesian? I note, in passing, that there's a surprising amount of literacy in Artesia, for a quasi-medieval society. But even so, it's not plausible that a two-year old would be literate even in his native language, unless he was some sort of infant prodigy.
There's a lot of cruelty in this book, but little actual carnage. People are cold-cocked, and have chamber pots dropped on them. But there are only three actual deaths in the book, and one is offscreen.
Perhaps the worst torture (suggested but not actually carried out) is the threat to deprive the hero of his ability to DREAM. This would not only be fatal: it would cause terrible suffering before it killed, whether or not the victim is in smelling range of azalea bushes. Fortunately it's not enacted: but even the possibility of threatening it is terrifying.
Lafayette o'Leary is something of a rogue, truth be known. He protests that he's a victim of misunderstandings...and sometimes he is. But he sets up the conditions for the misunderstandings.
At the beginning, he's also something of a lush. It's perhaps understandable that he drinks to avoid the tedium of his original life. But the fact that, having escaped to Artesia, his first plan is to go to a tavern and get roaring drunk indicates that he can't blame it all on circumstances.
Anybody who has read older books and seen older shows will know that alcohol consumption was pretty prolific until about the early 70s, when other drugs began to seriously challenge the monopoly. But the sheer volume of drinking is astonishing in fiction from this period.
These cavils aside, o'Leary is a fairly loveable rogue. And the series has some fascinating conceits. The existence of a transdimensional secret government (which seems to mostly consist of keeping people from trying to spread their power to other dimensions--and otherwise has a strictly hands-off policy (which, like the Prime Directive from Star Trek, is indifferently observed)) acts as something of a deus ex machina--but not very much so, since they tend to manipulate natives into doing their work for them.
This is not the best book in the series. I originally sought it out and read in just in the interests of getting caught up on the background of later books. But it still has some pretty good elements, such as the Coke Machine in the desert. And it contains a pretty good description of an only slightly extraordinary guy coming to terms with unanticipated abilities, and exploring their limitations and potentials.
I won't give away the 'surprise' ending, though it's telegraphed from early on. I'll just note that the resolution is not typical of such premises.
And I'll also note that there are a lot of unresolved issues. Why SHOULD Lafayette be able to do what he can? Granted it becomes somewhat moot at the end, once the Suppressor is activated: but it's never really answered. O'Leary rejects 'magic' as the answer: but what other answer really satisfies all the conclusions? Come to that, how can he read Artesian? I note, in passing, that there's a surprising amount of literacy in Artesia, for a quasi-medieval society. But even so, it's not plausible that a two-year old would be literate even in his native language, unless he was some sort of infant prodigy.
There's a lot of cruelty in this book, but little actual carnage. People are cold-cocked, and have chamber pots dropped on them. But there are only three actual deaths in the book, and one is offscreen.
Perhaps the worst torture (suggested but not actually carried out) is the threat to deprive the hero of his ability to DREAM. This would not only be fatal: it would cause terrible suffering before it killed, whether or not the victim is in smelling range of azalea bushes. Fortunately it's not enacted: but even the possibility of threatening it is terrifying.
December 12, 2008
The first time I read this was 27 years ago (I went through a dozen Keith Laumer titles back then). Feeling nostalgic again. This one is the first Lafayette O'Leary adventure (there are four). Lafayette is an aimless guy who suddenly finds himself transported to a quasi-medieval land called Artesia. In no time he gets himself in a sticky situation where he's framed for the abduction of a princess and trapped in a promise to slay the dragon controlled by a giant named Lod. Also, the court magician seems to be hiding some curious secrets. It's light stuff, very light actually but a quick trip down memory lane. The Lafayette O'Leary adventures have always stuck with me. I thought they were great back when I was a bored teen. The title really doesn't fit, though.
October 9, 2011
If this were a children's book, it would probably be pretty fantastic. As a work of science fiction (or fantasy for that matter), it disappoints. Everything from the characters, to the plot, even the writing is juvenile. If you haven't read it as a child, you probably won't enjoy it.
Read
August 6, 2015Pleasant way to spend some time reading. I haven't read any other Laumer books that I know of, so not much to compare it with. I read this because a friend talked about it. This seems like a good way to start a universe-hopping series.
December 21, 2014
1983 grade B-
series book OL1
series book OL1
October 5, 2016
Fun time travel/fantasy adventure book
May 19, 2012
Fun read - typical alternate universe type story which Laumer is good at
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