Star Smashers Of the Galaxy Rangers [Mass Market Paperback]

Harry Harrison (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 5, 1955

The wild, galaxy-hopping adventures of brash young scientists Jerry Courtenay and Chuck van Chider are at the core of this classic space opera. When the two college students develop a faster-than-light space drive in their homemade workshed, they decide to sneak it aboard their football team's airplane as a prank. The boyish plan backfires, however, and the boys find themselves, along with their crush Sally and the seemingly loveable school caretaker, Old John, hurtling through the solar system towards Titan—an icy moon of Saturn inhabited by hideous ice creatures. Titan and the 20th century are only square one as the foursome becomes embroiled in a vast, intergalactic, century-jumping battle.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Harry Harrison is the author of Make Room! Make Room!, on which the movie Soylent Green was based, as well as Deathworld, Stars and Stripes in Peril, and The Stainless Steel Rat Saves the World. He lives in Imperial Beach, California.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 190 pages
• Publisher: Berkley; 1st edition (May 5, 1955)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0425026884
• ISBN-13: 978-0425026885
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,487,065 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A fun farce of a space opera, though a little dated., January 28, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Star smashers of the Galaxy Rangers (Hardcover)

Chuck and Jerry didn't know what to expect when Jerry put cheese in the particle accelerator, but they surely didn't expect to have to end up saving the galaxy from the mind controlling Lortonoi.

This is a fun farce, though not nearly as shocking and titillating as it must have been when it first appeared in 1973.

Still, a good read.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Hilarious! But more so to some readers..., May 17, 1998

By 

Helena Handbasket (Silicon valley) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Star Smashers of the Galaxy Rangers (Hardcover)

This is one funny, funny, enjoyable book. A farcical take off on silly space operas, the action is wild, the characters hilariously idiotic, the settings imaginitive, and one of my favorite all-time endings.

But it's even funnier if you've read the grand old space operas of E.E. "Doc" Smith. This is a dead-on satire of Smith's most famous works, the "Lensman" and "Skylark" series. Harrison gets in all of Smith's trademarks: The hysterical prose, the cliffhanger chapter endings, the amazing BEMs, the questionalbe science, the all-American cardboard idiocy of the heroes, the vapidity of the heroines, the simplistic black-and-white morality, the wonderful and imaginitive settings, the jingonistic patriotism, the nonstop action, even Smith's love of a good steak. If you've read any of Smith's work (and possibly if you haven't), you'll laugh until you wet your pants.

Good hunting! Copies are kind of rare, so start now!

7 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Funnier than The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, February 15, 2001

By 

Headbang8 (Bogenhausen, Munich) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Star smashers of the Galaxy Rangers (Hardcover)

I am prompted to write because I just finished reading a comparable book, Douglas Adams' Hitch Hikers' Guide to the Galaxy, after hearing the radio shows many years ago. THHGTTG doesn't make its way into prose very well, and seems really dated.

By contrast, Harrison's is really sharp satire, and he uses the liberties that science fiction gives him to make his points with great force and absurd humour.

If we discover a species is stupider than we first thought, can we eat them? Who should one side with in a war; a cruel democracy or a kind dictatorship? And when does hero-worship cross the line into homoeroticism?

Harrison raises issues of politics, racism, sexism and a thousand other touchy subjects in a hilarious and outrageous book.

The galaxy's star-fleet being led by a souped-up 747 is a delightful image which sticks in my mind from this book.

Oh, and I think Harrison raided his legal textbooks to name the aliens. A garnishee is a claim you can make over someone's wages or property, and Lord Percy was an English Judge.

This book deserves to be in print again....and, especially, tobe made into a high-budget movie.