The Inheritors / Gateway to Never [Mass Market Paperback]

A. Bertram Chandler (Author)

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 377 pages
• Publisher: Ace (June 1978)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0441370640
• ISBN-13: 978-0441370641
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #808,543 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Smooth, Expert... and Routine, January 12, 2008

By 

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

This review is from: The Inheritors / Gateway to Never (Mass Market Paperback)

Here is a pair of Rim Worlds adventures featuring John Grimes and the villainous but legalistic Drongo Kane. Both novels were originally published in 1972; but _The Inheritors_ takes place fairly early in Grimes's career, when he is an unmarried Captain, while _Gateway to Never_ occurs when he is a Commodore and married to Sonya Verrill. The first novel involves slavery and genetic engineering (with a nod to Cordwainer Smith), while the second involves skulduggery with a mind-expanding drug called dreamy weed. Both novels are sea-stories-as-deep-space-adventures and are good on details as to how the Space Navy, Customs officials, and Planetary Police would operate. They are good space operas, smoothly and expertly told.

But there is something missing. Neither novel is particularly original. There is no sense of wonder. There is no dazzle, no poetry, no depth of thought. They aren't really bad, but they are routine.

Perhaps, however, a few more words can be said about these novels. Each one is directly connected to a preceeding story. _The Inheritors_ follows _Spartan Planet_ (1969). In the previous novel, Grimes intervenes in the doings of a society on a lost colony. Peggy Lazenby, one of his officers, predicts that Grimes will pay for his actions. Her prediction prooves true. The opening line of _The Inheritors_ reads: "Grimes was on the carpet-- neither for the first nor last time" (1). The text makes it clear that he is trouble over his actions on Sparta, even though the current rulers there like him. _Gateway to Never_ depicts a friendship between Grimes and a Captain Clavering, who runs a resort with his wife on an infernal planet. Clavering's adventure is told in a short story, "Forbidden Planet" (_Fantastic Universe_, 1959). The story is reprinted in the collection, _Beyond the Galactic Rim_ (1963).