Customer Reviews

Judgment Night: Facsimile Reproduction Of The 1952 First Edition

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This Red Jacket Press edition is a reprint of the 1952 Gnome Press collection of 5 C.L. Moore novellas and short stories. It is slipcased, and is a beautiful reproduction of the original, right down to the back cover listing of other Gnome Press books - go click on "Look inside" and you'll see what I mean. So the while the physical book itself is a work of art, how do the contents hold up to actually read?

Moore was most famous for her creations Jirel of Joiry and Northwest Smith, and there are echoes of both those characters in places here. A sci-fi version of Jirel is pretty clearly showing through the lines of Princess Juille in Judgment Night - both are warrior-women with a hidden feminine side, fierce in defence of their realm, even to the extent of plotting murder of an emissary under a flag of truce! Juille is fighting a final, losing war against barbarians - in between skipping off to a pleasure moon for a few days to explore her feminine side. There is romance, battle, betrayal and abduction, all on spectacularly drawn worlds. This is full of action, with a surprising and satisfying twist at the end that changes all that you have read.

The other stories are all shorter, and show Moore's range. "Paradise Street" is a sci-fi western, which reads like Moore was channeling Leigh Brackett, at least until you realise she is in fact giving us an older and more hardbitten version of her own Northwest Smith. Jaime Morgan is a man on the edges of civilisation, on a planet that is now becoming civilised, perhaps the last of his type. Themes of freedom, civilisation and corruption all shine brightly, and if you liked Firefly and Serenity, you'll enjoy reading this. "Promised Land" is a story about humanity, alienation, and what makes us human in times of genetic engineering. "The Code" is a little think piece about the dangers of science, and "Heir Apparent" is longish adventure tale with a AI slant.

All of the stories are different, and all cover different types of "science fiction". There is something here for everyone, with the added interest for the distaff that C.L. Moore was one of the earliest female grand masters of sci-fi. If you are prepared to pay a pretty steep cover price, you'll find a work of art, on a number of a levels.