Science Fiction is not my thing (nor the site’s), but I have read some really good stuff by the likes of Sir Arthur C. Clarke, the co-creator of 2001 a Space Odyssey and the Big Brain behind the communications satellite.
Long long ago in this particular galaxy, my brother gave me Childhood’s End to read because, in his opinion, I “should read something intelligent once in a while.” Older siblings tend to rate and vex younger, far livelier lifeforms with snide little observations, but in this case a person who was easily hook, line and sinkered by the “reality” of professional wrestling and remained so until a disgraceful age, had gotten it right.
Written in 1953, Clarke was at the time smitten with the possibility of ESP being real. Later, he did not quite repudiate the possibility but he found further studies to be lackluster and inconclusive at best. Still, the notion led to a book that is still with us for a lifetime, and it appears a good bet to reach a hundred before it eventually is swallowed by the mists of time.
The opening is spectacular and was later “borrowed” by Independence Day. Giant spaceships arrive and park themselves above the major cities of the world. I believe some nation took a potshot at one, to no effect, but that might have happened in another story.
Unlike the Will Smith flick, the aliens are friendly. But they are also firm: They were assigned to be caretakers of earth, for a damn good reason that cannot be specified. Nor will they show their faces until a certain amount of time goes by. Humankind was placed on guard and on a Need to Know Basis. Not everyone liked this much (I know how I would have felt about it).
The idea of not showing their faces for what turned out to be fifty years was brilliant. I bet Steve King wished he had a pay off as sense-making as the one Clarke came up with in Childhood’s End for It, but Steve is closer to being a billionaire than the rest of us, so tough luck.
The leader of the race that the humans called the Overlords was named Karellen. One of Clarke’s few weaknesses was in creating alien names. His were every bit as hokey as those on Buck Rodgers. For the first half of the book humankind was represented by the Secretary General of the UN, Rikki Stormgren, a fine three dimensional character, of the sort most science fiction writers are notoriously poor about creating. The relationship between Karellen (who appeared to be eternal, or close enough for people) and Rikki is warm and humorous and details the early years of the mystery and includes a kidnapping and some fine trickery. It is truly an effective way to hook the reader and leads perfectly to the second half of the story in which everything is eventually explained.
For the benefit of anyone who wants to read it, I will go no further. But I will say that it is possibly the only thing Clarke ever wrote (and he wrote a bunch of great things) that has been described by more than one top critic as “deeply moving.” For me that is one hell of a compliment (and I think, a fitting one) for a book that features the names Karellen and various vaguely manly alphabet soup conglomerations (interestingly, there were no female Overlords–a tell of Clarke’s time, I imagine).
literally stories 
Leila,
Like you, many of my favourite reads have come from recommendations, so I’ll follow up this one. My uninformed view is that SciFi is really good genre for comedy (Hitchikers Guide to the Glaxary, Galaxy Quest, Paul, etc), so maybe it would be excellent in other fields too. thanks for the recommendation – mick
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Hi Mick
Thank you! Yes, we are lucky when a good percentage of good books find their way to us from friends and relatives. I actually lack the needed nerve to approach someone with a book. I have remedied that by placing a few I can live without (usually because of kindle) and hope they pick the right one.
I would starve if I worked in sales.
Thanks again!
Leíla
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It’s not my favourite genre either but I was hooked on both The Martian and Hail Mary Project. Books and films of both. Just shows to go ya that you shouldn’t discount anything in the literary world. Except maybe those ‘Grey’ things. You make this sound interesting. Thank you as always. dd
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Thank you Diane
The funny thing here is at least half of the eight or ten books I’ve selected for this topic were given to me to read because other people understood that I would like them even though they “were not my thing.” Not everything people have suggested have been winners, but a large percentage that cannot be ignored have come out very well. I would have never thought to read this one if not for Jack (there also have been winners suggested by you, Hugh, Mick and Dale via this shared column). So, I listen when smart people suggest stuff for me.
Could be that some people understand us better than we think they do!
Thanks again!
Leila
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Thanks for the tip. Rendezvous with Rama is good, too. It’s curious how fabulist and magic realism have come to be considered “literary” while scifi hasn’t, for the most part.
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Hi David
Yes, yes Rama is a very good read. After Childhood’s End I read a lot of Sir Arthur –he was also was quite good at short works like the “Nine Billion Names of God” and the utterly brilliant “The Star”. And the “Sentinel” which Kubrick obviously liked.
And I feel, although I do not read as much as many do, Science Fiction should be considered a literary art form. Along with Clarke, Asimov, Bradbury, Harlan Ellison, Ursula (whose last name I will not attempt- Le Guine?), Theodore Sturgeon (whose own tale called “It” is as great as the King novel), and Clifford Sidamak (another name I know I’ve mangled) were great story tellers. I guess I have read a lot of sci-fi, but very little that was produced after the 80’s when it became somewhat corporate backed, which kills the cool in everything.
Thanks again!
Leila
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Leila
Thanks for this charming essay about a book I’ve never read but now plan to check out! Also, it has a brilliant title.
I agree with you that science fiction, at its best, should be considered a literary and not just a pulp genre. It has had a huge impact on all American writing in a million different ways that many books could be written about. The means of production, or way it was published, for decades in inexpensive paperbacks and magazines that appeared on news stands and so forth is one fascinating angle and there are many others.
I also consider Kurt Vonnegut to be, essentially, a science fiction writer. He isn’t a typical science fiction writer, but he churned out many novels and stories that can definitely be considered “pulp,” as well as all his other stuff that is obviously straight-up, Mark Twain-style, capital L, “Literature.”
I’m also a huge huge huge fan of Philip K. Dick, more as a philosopher and visionary than as an actual writer. And probably my two favorite novels by him, VALIS and A SCANNER DARKLY, are just as much “drug novels” as they are science fiction. But they are really “mind, heart, and spirit” novels in their essence. The man literally predicted the modern world we are living in right now, decades before now. And his characters are usually very much three-dimensional, fully-fleshed-out, well-rounded characters.
Science fiction also had a massive impact on literary writers like Jorge Luis Borges. And Mark Twain himself wrote some very early science fiction things (and Poe is even, sometimes, credited with inventing the genre, along with a few French writers).
Thanks again! Your writing about books is always charming, generous, educational, full of positivity: angelic.
Dale
PS
Superman and Batman, those two mythological American characters, are also science fiction!!
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Hello Dale
Yes, Vonnegut is science fiction quite often. Slaughterhouse Five: A Children’s Crusade can be considered that–with that unstuck in time and those Trafalmadorians (sp-I’m close, I think). R.I.P. Valerie Perrine.
It’s often hard to decide where the term begins for me. I look at S. Five as a memoir of his time as a POW in Dresden–which, along with his mother’s suicide were the defining events in his life. Personally, I find the usual space zapping stuff to be nothing but a western set in space–Roddenberry sold Star Trek as Wagon Train in the stars. Real S.F. should make you consider…
Thank you as always!
Leila
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My all time favorite science fiction novel!
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Hi John
Thank you for dropping by. Now that I think about it, I have to agree!
Leila
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Hi Leila
I’ll have to check it out “Childhood’s End.” I’m like Dale, a fan of Phillip K. Dick and Vonnegut. I really like how Ray Bradbury writes. One story of his that isn’t science fiction that’s great is “The Crowd.”
It was fun and enlightening to read your essay. This line summed up earthlings, “swallowed by the mists of time.
CJA
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Hi CJA
Dick is/was a talent. Blade Runner is a cool title but I would have liked to have seen the Androids dreaming of electric sheep get over. Theodore Sturgeon deserves memory as does that old perv grok Heinlien (sp). Vonnegut and Ellison were/are singular because you really cannot place them. “Fantasy” is too vague and their s.f. is too fantastic. Same goes for Charles Beaumont and Richard Matheson. I guess good will have to do.
Thanks again!
Leila
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Hi Leila,
I have been sitting here for the last ten minutes trying to think on a Science Fiction book that I’ve read…
Nope, I have nothing!
The closest I can get is ‘The Tommyknockers’ by Stephen King. But I can’t count that as I didn’t finish it due to me hating it. As much as I can, I will finish a book and from four hundred read, (It should be more but I’ve only read three since doing this) I’ve only gave up on three. The one already mentioned, ‘Black Dog’ by Stephen Booth and ‘Under Purple Sheets’ by Coco Houston.
One of these was complete and utter shite and terribly edited, the other two, well, that could have simple been my reading choice.
This has just came to me!! I had a Star Trek Annual 1973 (Still have somewhere)…Does that count?? And I read ‘The Flowering Of The Strange Orchid by H.G. Wells…Not sure what genre that is though???
Anyhow – Arthur C. Clarke. I’ve never read anything but he did a show called ‘Mysterious World’ early eighties and that fucking crystal skull thing freaked me out. I’m not sure that any found were ancient or all fake, I don’t care, it still freaked me out!!!
And you have hit on something – The names in Science Fiction have constantly been bad!
Excellent!!
Hugh
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Hi Hugh
Yes I recall The Mysterious World of AC Clarke. I think that skull was dug up in somewhere like Honduras–Latin America for sure.
One thing I’ll share with you is the reason why the aliens in this book concealed themselves for fifty years. They looked exactly like Satan–the version with wings, horns, red eyes and barbed tails. When that is revealed it is both funny and sense making. More importantly, they were a “race memory” to people. Their arrival meant the end of the human race as a biological form, but going on as a part of a larger universal entity. So when artists conceived the “devil” they were actually tapping into a psyci thing that really meant the future.
I do not believe anyone has gotten s.f. names correctly. Star Wars and Star Trek put some thought into theirs, yet at the same time those sound entirely human to me. Just creative people names. I can imagine a “Altarian” writer catching hell (or its version) for naming its monsters Jim and Susan.
Thanks as always!
Leila
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