Children of the Lens [Paperback]

E.E. Smith (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Pyramid Books (1972)
• ISBN-10: 0515021954
• ISBN-13: 978-0515021950
• ASIN: B000KTRKH2
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #7,092,381 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Outstanding conclusion of the Lensman series, June 8, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Children of the Lens (The Lensman Series, Book 6) (Paperback)

This book introduces the five children (Kit Kinnison and his sisters) who will lead the final battle against the evil Eddorians. As always, E.E. Smith's dialog is dated, (when was the last time you did a flit?) but that only adds to the charm of the story. It seems in his time, there were only men and girls, and everyone smoked cigarettes.

This story is the slam-bang conclusion of the series in which ever greater powers of good and evil are called into action. My only criticism is that in this book Kimball Kinnison's time is past, and he remains on center stage too long. Once the most powerful man in Civilization, even he is no match for an Eddorian. In the previous two books, his adventures were the deeds of a superhuman second-stage Lensman. But now he seems almost irrelevant, as his far more powerful kids have to protect him. The attitude is, well, we'd better keep an eye on Dad - he's too feeble-minded to know we're actually fighting Eddore.

A priceless scene occurs when Clarissa Kinnison introduces one of her daughters to the evil matriarch of Lyrane II. The villainess thinks as she attacks, "Ah, the daughter is younger and less experienced. She will be easy prey." Oops!

The last fifty pages are worth rereading over and over, as the combined forces of good slug it out with the last bastion of evil in the galaxy. It is the climax of six novels, and it does not disappoint. Enjoy the slang and the hokey dialog, as most modern writers don't have the jets to swing this load.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Grand Old Space Opera, November 20, 2009

By 

Paul Camp (Chattanooga, TN United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Children of the Lens (The Lensman Series, Book 6) (Paperback)

Here it is. Accept no substitutes. _Children of the Lens_ (_Astounding_, 1947-48; 1954) is the final volumn in E.E. Smith's Lensman sequence. It brings the conflict between the heroic Space Patrol members and the cold and villainous Boskonians to a dramatic conclusion, with the entire galaxy at stake. And I'll be damned if there isn't a bit of humor along the way.

Early in the novel, there is a chapter entitled "Kinnison Writes a Space Opera". Kimball Kinnison poses as a popular writer named Sybly White for a period of time and writes a novel to stay in character. Here is a sampling of his work:

Qadgop the Mercotan slithered flatly around the afterbulge of the tranship. One claw dug into the meters-thick armor of pure neutronium, then another. Its terrible xmexlike snout locked on. Its zymolosely polydactile tongue crunched out, crashed down, rasped across. _Slurp! Slurp!_ At each abrasive stroke the groove in the tranship's plating deepened and Qaggop leered more fiercely. Fools! Did they think that the airlessness of absolute space, the heatlessness of absolute zero, the yieldlessness of absolute neutronium could stop QADGOP THE MERCOTAN? (39)

Wilson Tucker coined the term "space opera" in 1941 to describe a type of hackneyed and cliched science fiction. When Doc Smith began writing the Lensman sequence in the late 1930s, the term was unknown. Less than ten years later, Smith was able to guy his own traditions and style of writing using Tucker's term.

But in spite of this self-parody, we properly think of Smith as the Big Daddy of classical space opera, which developed between roughly 1925 and 1950. Aside from Smith, the four big practitioners of classical space opera were John W. Campbell, Jr., Edmond Hamilton, Jack Williamson, and Ray Cummings. There were others who practiced it on a now-and-again basis: Manly Wade Wellman, Clifford D. Simak, Murray Leinster, and Frank Belknap Long. These writers did not describe the conventions of space opera; they invented them.

Practitioners of grand, or classical, space opera frequently took their writing seriously. Doc Smith certainly did. He was not concerned with making a quick sale, collecting a check, and moving on to the next story. He wanted to write science fiction that would last for a long period of time. He wrote slowly and revised frequently. His science fiction was for the most part "played straight" or told with a poker face. We do Smith a disservice if we think of him as a hack.

Gary Westfahl (1994) notes that for a time, in the 1930s, E.E. Smith was considered the model of what a science fiction writer should be. By the late 1940s, however, there were a great many writers in the field who were writing science fiction that was more sophisticated, profound, and literate than Smith's best. Westfahl notes that at this time, readers were more aware of the juvenile, action-oriented nature of his novels. (_Children_ received only a lukewarm reception when it was serialized in _Astounding_.) By the 1950s, Smith was perceived by many to be a back number who was unable to write modern fare.

But we seem to have strayed from the story. Who are the children of the lens? On one level, they are the five children of Kimball and Clarissa Kinnison (characters modeled after Smith's own children), who have even more powers than their parents. On another level, the children are the various races of the galaxy that have been guided by the Mentor towards maturity. This is all part of Smith's hierarchical universe in which knowledge and power increase, and it is passable fun. But it becomes a little too easy to escape from cliffhanging predicaments when you have super powers or when you can be rescued by one of the kids. _Galactic Patrol_ (1950) was a bit more fun for me.

We are told that the novel that Kinnison writes "was later acclaimed as one of Sybly White's best" (39). After his death in 1965, it seems as if Smith's works are being continuously reprinted-- to considerable popular acclaim. Perhaps he had the last laugh after all.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great read. The best Space Opera of all time., May 22, 2000

By 

Darrel Carver (Boise, Idaho) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Children of the Lens (The Lensman Series, Book 6) (Paperback)

I first read this series in the 1970's, and repurchased them in the 1980's. The Science Fiction Book Club just released the whole series in a two volume set. However you can get a hold of these, get them. They are a great read. John W. Campbell did another series in the 40's as a great space opera but the lensman series is the best.