Customer Reviews

Trader To The Stars

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This is a collection of short stories which take place in Poul Anderson's "Polesotechnic League" ("League of Selling Skills") aka Nicholas Van Rijn series. The premise is simple: 1) Humans have achieved cheap interstellar travel; 2) There are many other intelligent races and inhabited planets; 3) Humans and aliens alike are just as greedy in the future as humans are now.

Unlike "Star Trek" (which I also love!) and some other science fiction prognostications about the future, this series never, ever, assumes that people (or aliens) are or will become morally superior to people in the present day. There is no "Prime Directive" here. No, in Anderson's universe, most people are out to make a buck, and space is dominated by merchant-adventurers who make no bones about their aim of pursuing profit. Anderson presents this as mostly a good thing, albeit not without its moral hazards. The bad guys more often than not are politicians, whom Anderson more often than not, scorns. The good guys (and gals) are merchant-adventurers who, in their pursuit of profit, encounter some pretty wild situations and get into some pretty interesting (sometimes quite funny) predicaments.

The stories in this collection are highly readable, well-written, and quite imaginative. They always involve clever applications of scientific speculation combined with a good storyline. The stories generally do a fine job of keeping the reader's interest. They are crisply written and move along smartly, unlike some of Anderson's later writings (see my reviews of "Harvest of Stars" and "The Stars are also Fire" by Anderson--some of his later works.)

This book is highly recommended. If you like this one, don't miss "The Trouble Twisters" which is the next book in the series, also a collection of short stories set in the Polesotechnic League future. Enjoy both.

This book contains three stories published in the in the 50s, and deals with adventures of Nicholas Van Rijn and the Polesotechnic League. Interesting stuff, for a quick read. Anderson tries to create realistic worlds based on real facts. Each story deals with the League (a loosely federated group of merchants) and its encounters with a new civilization. Each story is a little puzzle in its own way, of how the League will deal successfully with the new civilizations it encounters. Kinda sociological Sherlock Holmes stuff. Very well thought out, and logical, with some of the fun of golden age sci-fi thrown in.

The first book in Anderson's Future History, set in the era of the Polesotechnic League (the predecessor of the Terran Empire that spawned his later character Dominic Flandry), focuses on the utterly unequalled Nicholas Van Rijn, boss of Solar Spice & Liquors and an often-reluctant venturer to distant worlds in pursuit of profit. Fat, hook-nosed, speaking a less-than-perfect Anglic and showing a definite lascivious streak, Van Rijn nevertheless is "a blue-ribbon spaceman" and very keen-witted, and saves the day every time in these three short novels. Anderson is considered a "hard-sf" writer, yet the alien species and societies he imagines, while naturally shaped by their environments, are drawn with great skill. (He does have a certain tendency to "tell, not show," though he often does it through dialogue--but since the data is indispensable to the story, obviously he has to find some way to provide his readers with it, even if they aren't as clever as Van Rijn is about making use of it.) In each outing Van Rijn is confronted by a species strange to him and must reason out why it behaves as it does or how to find it when it decides to hide on a zoo-transport starship among the animals. The real fun, of course, is seeing how this very unheroic "poor old man" turns the tables on everyone while moaning and groaning about his troubles.

Sunday, November 05, 2006
"Trader to the Stars" by Poul Anderson, ©1964
This is not a typical story. It is more like a mystery story. The first story is typical adventure and swashbuckling, the Danish hero, Nicholas van Rijn, even gets the girl in the end. It is a good start. The next two stories are more in the mode of mysteries: facts are told, deductions made and in the end everything is okay.
On an icebound planet some do-gooders are trying to save the population from extinction a thousand years in the future. Mr. van Rijn deduces the problem and acts on it to the happiness of all. It is sort of a big gamble he takes and wins, but it is a story about him. In real life, the odds are the gamble would not work, but such is life.
The other two stories are about trade missions that have problems with the natives. Mr. van Rijn solves all the problems with a bit of analysis and thinking. It is rather impressive.

Sunday, November 05, 2006
"Trader to the Stars" by Poul Anderson, ©1964
This is not a typical story. It is more like a mystery story. The first story is typical adventure and swashbuckling, the Danish hero, Nicholas van Rijn, even gets the girl in the end. It is a good start. The next two stories are more in the mode of mysteries: facts are told, deductions made and in the end everything is okay.
On an icebound planet some do-gooders are trying to save the population from extinction a thousand years in the future. Mr. van Rijn deduces the problem and acts on it to the happiness of all. It is sort of a big gamble he takes and wins, but it is a story about him. In real life, the odds are the gamble would not work, but such is life.
The other two stories are about trade missions that have problems with the natives. Mr. van Rijn solves all the problems with a bit of analysis and thinking. It is rather impressive.

Sunday, November 05, 2006
"Trader to the Stars" by Poul Anderson, ©1964
This is not a typical story. It is more like a mystery story. The first story is typical adventure and swashbuckling, the Danish hero, Nicholas van Rijn, even gets the girl in the end. It is a good start. The next two stories are more in the mode of mysteries: facts are told, deductions made and in the end everything is okay.
On an icebound planet some do-gooders are trying to save the population from extinction a thousand years in the future. Mr. van Rijn deduces the problem and acts on it to the happiness of all. It is sort of a big gamble he takes and wins, but it is a story about him. In real life, the odds are the gamble would not work, but such is life.
The other two stories are about trade missions that have problems with the natives. Mr. van Rijn solves all the problems with a bit of analysis and thinking. It is rather impressive.

from the back cover of the January 1977 Berkley Medallion edition

As humanity begins to expand into the galaxy, great pioneers lead. NICHOLAS VAN RIJN, the trader, owner of the Solar Spice and Liquors Company - capitalist, free spirit, manager: the man who counts.

HIDING PLACE

TERRITORY

THE MASTER KEY

Sunday, November 05, 2006
"Trader to the Stars" by Poul Anderson, ©1964
This is not a typical story. It is more like a mystery story. The first story is typical adventure and swashbuckling, the Danish hero, Nicholas van Rijn, even gets the girl in the end. It is a good start. The next two stories are more in the mode of mysteries: facts are told, deductions made and in the end everything is okay.
On an icebound planet some do-gooders are trying to save the population from extinction a thousand years in the future. Mr. van Rijn deduces the problem and acts on it to the happiness of all. It is sort of a big gamble he takes and wins, but it is a story about him. In real life, the odds are the gamble would not work, but such is life.
The other two stories are about trade missions that have problems with the natives. Mr. van Rijn solves all the problems with a bit of analysis and thinking. It is rather impressive.