The Men in The Jungle [Import] [Paperback]

Norman Spinrad (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Sphere Books (1972)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0722180861
• ISBN-13: 978-0722180860
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #7,996,990 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Norman Spinrad Bio


Reviews of HE WALKED AMONG US

Norman Spinrad's He Walked Among Us - Horror Drive-In

Norman Spinrad's He Walked Among Us






I'm always getting up here and urging you to buy this book, or to go see that movie. Buy a DVD or try a new author. I do it because I'm passionate about this stuff. And I swear to you that, regardless of whether you end up agreeing with me, I am always 100% honest about them.


Coming out on March 30th is what I consider to be the book of the year. It's He Walked Among Us, by Norman Spinrad. I bet it's already shipping now from Amazon.

Maybe you've read some Spinrad. Some pieces here and there. Or maybe you've been trying to make the time to read Bug Jack Barron for decades now. Or maybe you've read some of his books. My own personal favorites are Bug Jack Barron, The Iron Dream, Pictures at 11, Little Heroes, The Mind Game. My previous favorite was probably Norman's mainstream novel of Hollywood, Passing Through the Flame. My favorite now is He Walked Among Us.

Spinrad had trouble getting this book published and it boggles my mind. Here is not only one of the finest science fiction writers that ever published, but one of the most important writers of the modern age. I'm not kidding.

He Walked Among Us was previously published in a typically overpriced and poorly manufactured POD edition in 2004. Norman Spinrad having to put his work out in what is barely a notch above self publishing. It's criminal.

Why did he have such a difficult time getting He Walked Among Us published? For one thing, Spinrad has never been afraid to bite the hand that feeds him. He has been an acerbic critic of organized science fiction fandom for a long time. He paints the community in a harsh light in He Walked Among Us. I have the experience to tell you that his unflattering depictions of SF conventioneers is pretty damned accurate.

Also, Spinrad's career has been hard to classify in any one particular genre. He's known as a science fiction writer and many of his book fall solidly in that realm. Russian Spring, Songs From the Stars, The Void Captain's Tale, Greenhouse Summer, for examples. He has also written books that made him a popular figure in the counterculture, like The Children of Hamelin and Passing Through the Flame. There are stories that seem pulled direct from current events, such as The Mind Game and Pictures at 11. Spinrad has even done historical fiction: Mexica and The Druid King.

So what, exactly, is He Walked Among Us? Well, that's a hard one. In a way it's science fiction. It's also an acidly satiric satire of show business. The novel is screamingly funny at times. There are New Age aspects to He Walked Among Us. It's philosophical. It might deal with Quantum Physics, but I'm not exactly sure. And it also has some hardcore scenes that might make Edward Lee wince.

Jimmy Balaban is an aging, seedy, third rate show biz agent. He meets a dubious comedian named Ralf who claims to be from the future. He's here to save us from ourselves. It's an odd act, but Jimmy is a pro and the nose knows. Maybe there is a little bit of money to be made from this strange act. He takes Ralf on as a client and hires a male science fiction writer and a female New Age guru to turn Ralf into the cash cow that he always wanted. Astonishingly, it works. The question remains: Who, or what, is Ralf?

Spinrad has called He Walked Among Us his magnum opus and I definitely agree. I've been a fan of his work for a long time and I've been continually blown away by his writing. He Walked Among Us, however, is a revelation.

Naturally, a lot of people aren't going to get it. This isn't an easy, simple book. Oh, it's easy enough to read, but it's even easier to dismiss it as gimmicky fluff. Worse, readers could feel that Spinrad has a condescending attitude toward his audience. That he's laughing at them or feeling smugly superior. I don't feel that way, but a complex novel like He Walked Among Us can be interpreted in endless ways. That's part of the beauty of it.

Spinrad has always had an amazing imagination, which is augmented by his own radical sensibilities. I've always felt an element of danger in his work.

Norman Spinrad recently announced on Facebook that he has been diagnosed with stomach cancer. He had previously been told that it was inoperable, but there is greater hope now. It's still terrible news. This writer is a treasure and it's horrible to think that we may be losing him soon. Perhaps he'll pull out of it. I've always perceived Norman Spinrad as a fighter and I believe that he'll fight this battle with the courage that he is known for possessing. Hopefully he'll emerge with his health and years of productive life ahead of him. Forget the vicious lie that everything that doesn't kill us makes us stronger. Cancer is the worst thing in the world and it'll take its toll on him.

Thankfully we have a large body of work from Norman Spinrad to keep us astonished, entertained, and best of all, to keep us thinking. And he's never done a better work than He Walked Among Us. This writer has been neglected for far too long. He Walked Among Us deserves to be a success. And Norman Spinrad deserves more respect than he has gotten lately. A lot more respect.

Please consider buying a copy of He Walks Among Us.

---Mark Sieber

Spinrad, Norman. He Walked Among Us. Tor. Apr. 2010. c.544p. ISBN 978-0-7653-2584-6. $27.99. SF

When talent agent Jimmy Balaban discovers an ad lib comic named Ralf who claims to be from the future, he recognizes a potential moneymaker. Together with a once-famous sf writer and a New Age guru, the trio transform Ralf into a messiah-like figure who brings a message about a desolate future and the need to transform the world in order to avert disaster. When Ralf refuses to break character, his handlers wonder whether he is their creation or whether his message from the future is in fact real. VERDICT First published in France, this latest novel by one of sf's most distinguished authors (Bug Jack Barron, The Iron Dream) presents a cautionary tale that is at once sardonically witty and intellectually thought-provoking. A big book in more than pagination, this meaty saga of a contemporary prophet is essential for sf fans.

Library Journal







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Norman Spinrad is the author of some 20 or so novels, five or six dozen short stories, a classic Star Trek epsisode, a couple of flop movies, an album's worth of songs, political columns, film criticism, literary criticicsm, mini-cookbooks, autobiography, and a bunch of assorted other stuff.
The latest to be written is a new and literarily revolutionary novel called WELCOME TO YOUR DREAMTIME, in which you, the reader are the viewpoint character, and sections of which have been published in a weird assortment of magazines as free-standing short stories.
The latest to be published in the US,by Tor, is HE WALKED AMONG US, a novel so far ahead of itself that it had to wait until it had become something of the fave rave of a radical viral internet distribution experiment and a cause celebre in France as IL EST PARMI NOUS before any traditional American publisher would bring it out in paper.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not for those with light stomachs, December 27, 2005

By 

M. J. Williams (Berkeley, CA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Men in the Jungle (Paperback)

The story begins centuries in the future where humankind is dispersed throughout the galaxy and war is common. Our protagonist narrowly escapes earth's clutches, carrying nothing but the clothes on his back, his very expensive ship, and a vast fortune in the only currency to have universal utility, drugs.

He ends up on a backward world, where one class of people has enslaved the others, and torture and prostitution is rife. He proceeds to start a civil war, and that's when the book really starts to get interesting. As dark as he is sick and disgusting, Spinrad also manages to do something few writers can, weave together a great story with incredibly realistic characters in an interesting narrative.

Buyers beware, however! This book is incredibly dark. Cannibalism, slavery, prostitution, and murder on a massive and bloody scale are just the beginning. If you enjoy well written sci-fi, then this is your book. Just also know that it is easily the darkest book in the sci-fi, and perhaps any genre, that I have ever come across.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Religion and Sadism meet on a far away planet., November 8, 2004

By 

me23 "braeloch23" (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Men in the Jungle (Paperback)

Protaganist travels to a back water planet and finds a world of misery run by an overlord of pain. Really a tale of mans acceptance of degredation as long as the gun isn't pointed his way. That being said the book is fun in a space opera way with the hero trying his best to save the populace from themselves. Good stuff

1 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Couldn't put it down,, March 25, 2011

By 

Lisbeth Andersson "Lisbeth" (S-145 67 Norsborg, Sweden) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Men in the Jungle (Paperback)

It has been a long time since I read this book, and the details are fortunately becoming fuzzy. What I do remember is that I felt nauseous for most of the time reading it, as somebody said, you need an iron cast stomach to handle it and my stomach isn't strong enough. I cannot think of anything that would make this book worth reading, it contains all disgusting practices humankind has ever thought of: torture, fights for the audience pleasure, human sacrifice, cannibalism (not even humanity has taken it to the level practiced in this book), genetic selection and women as somewhere below property.

Add to this a protagonist that is looking out for himself to the extent of not only participating in the above mentioned practicies but actually brings in new ideas of how to make torture worse and I couldn't care less about what happens to him. I tried to put the book down and get some sleep, but it didn't work, so I stayed up all night reading with the faint hope that if I got through it to the end it would somehow make sense. Unfortunately it didn't work. A little knowledge can possibly be a bad thing, and I had been reading a popular article of the art of leading a mob, which is the one quality the protagonist had, and it played a large role in the ending. There are two Don'ts in that art. Don't tell the mob to disband quietly and go home. That doesn't work, it's possible to distract them from general looting and destruction by suggesting a specific target (let's storm the Bastille) but any suggestion of stopping is likely to have the mob tearing you to pieces. The other Don't is don't give the members of the mob time to think, it will then stop being a mob and turn into a collection of individuals with all the instincts of preservation in full effect. IOW don't tell the mob to go home and come back tomorrow for what is in reality a suicide. That is what the protagonist is supposed to manage.

All in all, with the violence and dissapointing ending, I felt that this book would be a good candidate for a book burning.