Reproduced at the site below :-
"HOLLYWOOD, March 24 (UPI) - Leigh Brackett, writer of such movies as The Big Sleep and Star Wars Two, died last Saturday. She was 60 years old.
Among the films Miss Brackett wrote were Howard Hawks's Rio Bravo, Rio Lobo, and the Robert Altman remake of The Long Goodbye, and television script s, including Terror at Northfield for Alfred Hitchcock.
She was the widow of Edward Hamilton, and both of them wrote many science-fiction novels. Hers included the Hafling and Eric John Stark series, including The Ginger Star and The Hounds of Skaith."
3.5 out of 5
http://www.gcwillick.com/Spacelight/obit/leigho.html
Friday, May 28, 2010
Los Angeles Times - Leigh Brackett
Reproduced at the site below :-
"Screenwriter Leigh Brackett, whose credits include The Big Sleep and Rio Bravo has died of cancer at Lancaster Community Hospital at the age of 60. Ms. Brackett had just finished the first draft of the Star Wars sequel script before entering the hospital several weeks ago."
3 out of 5
http://www.gcwillick.com/Spacelight/obit/leigho.html
"Screenwriter Leigh Brackett, whose credits include The Big Sleep and Rio Bravo has died of cancer at Lancaster Community Hospital at the age of 60. Ms. Brackett had just finished the first draft of the Star Wars sequel script before entering the hospital several weeks ago."
3 out of 5
http://www.gcwillick.com/Spacelight/obit/leigho.html
Youngstown State Oral History Program - Leigh Brackett
A brilliant and wide-ranging interview:
"H: That's true. You carry these things around with you all the time. Very often, I get this far-away look and Ed will say, "You're thinking, aren't you?"
R: Do you try on your thoughts with each other?
H: Yes, a good bit. Our marriage almost broke up shortly
after it began because I had an order for a novel from
Startling Stories. It was a whole $800 and boy did
we need it.
E: What year was this?
H: This was in 1947; we were married at the end of 1946. I sat down at my typewriter and wrote the opening chapters. I handed them to Ed, he read it and said, "This is great. Where do you go from here?" I said, "I haven't the foggiest idea." He said, "That is a so-and-so way to write a story." Right there, we discovered we couldn't collaborate too well. So, I went on with it. Then I said, "I think I'm getting into a little bit of trouble here." He said, "Let me read it." So he read it and he said, "Back of chapter two, put in a Dhuvian--a Dhuvian being a strange alien character--on the ship." I could have killed him. The trouble was, he was right. So I had to throw away four chapters and start over again.
Thank you for this interview. We really feel it's been a privilege. We've enjoyed it so much.
You're so welcome. I hope I have been helpful to you. I'm flattered that you came all this way."
"Authors: Brackett, Leigh.
Roderick, Juanita.
Earnhart, Hugh G.
Title: Science fiction writing
Date Issued: 1975
Description: "Experiences as a Writer."
Transcript of interview taped on October 7, 1975. Tape length 63 minutes. Tape stored in History Department."
http://hdl.handle.net/1989/803
5 out of 5
http://digital.maag.ysu.edu:8080/jspui/bitstream/1989/803/2/OH19.pdf
"H: That's true. You carry these things around with you all the time. Very often, I get this far-away look and Ed will say, "You're thinking, aren't you?"
R: Do you try on your thoughts with each other?
H: Yes, a good bit. Our marriage almost broke up shortly
after it began because I had an order for a novel from
Startling Stories. It was a whole $800 and boy did
we need it.
E: What year was this?
H: This was in 1947; we were married at the end of 1946. I sat down at my typewriter and wrote the opening chapters. I handed them to Ed, he read it and said, "This is great. Where do you go from here?" I said, "I haven't the foggiest idea." He said, "That is a so-and-so way to write a story." Right there, we discovered we couldn't collaborate too well. So, I went on with it. Then I said, "I think I'm getting into a little bit of trouble here." He said, "Let me read it." So he read it and he said, "Back of chapter two, put in a Dhuvian--a Dhuvian being a strange alien character--on the ship." I could have killed him. The trouble was, he was right. So I had to throw away four chapters and start over again.
Thank you for this interview. We really feel it's been a privilege. We've enjoyed it so much.
You're so welcome. I hope I have been helpful to you. I'm flattered that you came all this way."
"Authors: Brackett, Leigh.
Roderick, Juanita.
Earnhart, Hugh G.
Title: Science fiction writing
Date Issued: 1975
Description: "Experiences as a Writer."
Transcript of interview taped on October 7, 1975. Tape length 63 minutes. Tape stored in History Department."
http://hdl.handle.net/1989/803
5 out of 5
http://digital.maag.ysu.edu:8080/jspui/bitstream/1989/803/2/OH19.pdf
Leigh Brackett - John Hamilton
A short article in here it appears.
The final frontier / by John Hamilton.
Edina, Minn. : ABDO Pub. Co., - The world of science fiction
32 pages 2007 English
Contents
Space Opera page 4
E. E. Smith page 10
Edmond Hamilton page 12
Leigh Brackett page 14
Buck Rogers page 16
Flash Gordon page 18
Star Trek page 20
Dune page 22
Star Wars page 24
New Space Opera page 26
Glossary page 30
Web sites page 31
Index page 32
3 out of 5
http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/19540362
At Google Book Search
http://books.google.com/books?id=BZ4jHxBQD8sC&printsec=frontcover&cd=1&source=gbs_ViewAPI#v=onepage&q=leigh%20brackett&f=false
The final frontier / by John Hamilton.
Edina, Minn. : ABDO Pub. Co., - The world of science fiction
32 pages 2007 English
Contents
Space Opera page 4
E. E. Smith page 10
Edmond Hamilton page 12
Leigh Brackett page 14
Buck Rogers page 16
Flash Gordon page 18
Star Trek page 20
Dune page 22
Star Wars page 24
New Space Opera page 26
Glossary page 30
Web sites page 31
Index page 32
3 out of 5
http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/19540362
At Google Book Search
http://books.google.com/books?id=BZ4jHxBQD8sC&printsec=frontcover&cd=1&source=gbs_ViewAPI#v=onepage&q=leigh%20brackett&f=false
Friday, May 21, 2010
Sunday, May 16, 2010
People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
Novel
Number of words : 39500
Percent of complex words : 5.9
Average syllables per word : 1.4
Average words per sentence : 12.5
READABILITY INDICES
Fog : 7.3
Flesch : 78.8
Flesch-Kincaid : 5.4
PEOPLE
Eric John Stark
N'Chaka, the Man-Without-a-Tribe. Earthman, out of Mercury.
Camar
A dying Martian.
Ciaran
The warlord of Mekh.
Ban Cruach
A great Martian king of old.
Thord
Leader of the Riders of Mekh.
Otar
One of Ciaran's men. Elderly and crazed.
Thanis
A Kushat girl who helps Stark. Balin's sister.
Lugh
The military leader in Kushat.
Balin
A soldier of Kushat. Thanis' brother.
Rogain
A noble in Kushat.
Tika
A girl Stark knew in his youth.
Narrabhar
A noble leader in Kushat.
Hrillin
One of the old race.
PLACES
Norland
A Martian desert region.
Kushat
Where Stark is heading. A city in the Martian north. The King City.
Thieves' Quarter
Where Camar was born.
Gates of Death
A pass that opens into the black mountains beyond Kushat. Domain of Ban Cruach.
Jekkara and Valkis and Barrakesh
Southern cities of Mars.
The Festival Stones
Two miles northeast of Kushat.
Quarter of the Tomb-Robbers
In Kushat. Quarter of the Blessed, a burying ground.
Kesh and Shun
Martin tribal areas.
Narrisan
The city that is Ciaran's eventual conqueror's goal.
Jekkara and Valkis
Cities of of the Sea-Kings.
Wells of Tamboin
Sand-drowned ruins.
Sinharat
City of the Ever-Living.
CONCEPTS
Lord of Silence
A deity.
High Martian
Ancient dialect.
TECHNOLOGY
Talisman
A crystal lens, some four inches across with an intricate interlocking of many
facets. Ban Cruach's, and contains his knowledge.
ORGANISATIONS
Riders of Mekh
Ciaran's barbarian warriors.
Drylanders
Martian desert dwellers.
Border States
Martian political area.
RACES
The old race
Golden skinned and large eyed, with thumb spurs.
WEAPONS
Globed weapons
Not a good idea to use, as they are not what they seem.
ANIMALS
Rock lizard
Martian desert reptile.
PLOT
Stark's friend Camar has taken the Talisman of Ban Cruach, and wants to take it back to Kushat. However, he has been mortally wounded, so passes it on to Stark.
Stark runs into a problem when he encounters the Riders of Merkh - a barbarian horde under the command of Lord Ciaran. He is brought in front of the lord, who shows both intelligence and brutality, but he manages to escape and make it to Kushat.
Despite being suspicious of Stark, they do take his advice and organise the city for war. The defense holds out for some time, but it is clear the city will fall.
Stark organises some people via Thanis to fall back to the Festival Stones, as a second line of defense. Ciaran is a strong leader and it doesn't take her long to take some men from the sacking of the city to go and put and end to this small band. However, Stark has a plan and lays a trap. He engineers a rockslide that cuts Ciaran off from all but a few of her men, and she is quickly captured after they are slain, and is now a hostage.
However, the Kushat exiles must go somewhere, and the draw of the talisman of Ban Cruach is strong, so they head for his old towers.
This place is strange, but also not empty. Dwelling there are the remnants of an old, decadent golden-skinned race. When they hear Kushat has fallen, and Ban Cruach's old promise of their safety gone, they aren't happy, but agree to arm the Kushat people with some of their advanced weaponry.
Except they don't, they aren't weapons of war. They have decided to end their days in a frenzied game of hunting and destroying humans and each other. After using the weapons, Stark has woken naked and unarmed, and is being herded. The talisman is destroyed by Hrillin.
Finally he finds the body of Rogain, and a sword. Not long after he encounters Ciaran, similarly armed, and he realised Hrillin knows they are enemies, and wants them to fight for their amusement. This pair of warriors has other plans, looking to breakout and fight their way to shutting down the mechanisms that keep the cold of the city at bay, allowing their antagonists' existence.
With the promise of power from this city gone, Stark makes a deal with Ciaran if she will take her army and leave, letting the Kushat people have their city back.
4 out of 5
Number of words : 39500
Percent of complex words : 5.9
Average syllables per word : 1.4
Average words per sentence : 12.5
READABILITY INDICES
Fog : 7.3
Flesch : 78.8
Flesch-Kincaid : 5.4
PEOPLE
Eric John Stark
N'Chaka, the Man-Without-a-Tribe. Earthman, out of Mercury.
Camar
A dying Martian.
Ciaran
The warlord of Mekh.
Ban Cruach
A great Martian king of old.
Thord
Leader of the Riders of Mekh.
Otar
One of Ciaran's men. Elderly and crazed.
Thanis
A Kushat girl who helps Stark. Balin's sister.
Lugh
The military leader in Kushat.
Balin
A soldier of Kushat. Thanis' brother.
Rogain
A noble in Kushat.
Tika
A girl Stark knew in his youth.
Narrabhar
A noble leader in Kushat.
Hrillin
One of the old race.
PLACES
Norland
A Martian desert region.
Kushat
Where Stark is heading. A city in the Martian north. The King City.
Thieves' Quarter
Where Camar was born.
Gates of Death
A pass that opens into the black mountains beyond Kushat. Domain of Ban Cruach.
Jekkara and Valkis and Barrakesh
Southern cities of Mars.
The Festival Stones
Two miles northeast of Kushat.
Quarter of the Tomb-Robbers
In Kushat. Quarter of the Blessed, a burying ground.
Kesh and Shun
Martin tribal areas.
Narrisan
The city that is Ciaran's eventual conqueror's goal.
Jekkara and Valkis
Cities of of the Sea-Kings.
Wells of Tamboin
Sand-drowned ruins.
Sinharat
City of the Ever-Living.
CONCEPTS
Lord of Silence
A deity.
High Martian
Ancient dialect.
TECHNOLOGY
Talisman
A crystal lens, some four inches across with an intricate interlocking of many
facets. Ban Cruach's, and contains his knowledge.
ORGANISATIONS
Riders of Mekh
Ciaran's barbarian warriors.
Drylanders
Martian desert dwellers.
Border States
Martian political area.
RACES
The old race
Golden skinned and large eyed, with thumb spurs.
WEAPONS
Globed weapons
Not a good idea to use, as they are not what they seem.
ANIMALS
Rock lizard
Martian desert reptile.
PLOT
Stark's friend Camar has taken the Talisman of Ban Cruach, and wants to take it back to Kushat. However, he has been mortally wounded, so passes it on to Stark.
Stark runs into a problem when he encounters the Riders of Merkh - a barbarian horde under the command of Lord Ciaran. He is brought in front of the lord, who shows both intelligence and brutality, but he manages to escape and make it to Kushat.
Despite being suspicious of Stark, they do take his advice and organise the city for war. The defense holds out for some time, but it is clear the city will fall.
Stark organises some people via Thanis to fall back to the Festival Stones, as a second line of defense. Ciaran is a strong leader and it doesn't take her long to take some men from the sacking of the city to go and put and end to this small band. However, Stark has a plan and lays a trap. He engineers a rockslide that cuts Ciaran off from all but a few of her men, and she is quickly captured after they are slain, and is now a hostage.
However, the Kushat exiles must go somewhere, and the draw of the talisman of Ban Cruach is strong, so they head for his old towers.
This place is strange, but also not empty. Dwelling there are the remnants of an old, decadent golden-skinned race. When they hear Kushat has fallen, and Ban Cruach's old promise of their safety gone, they aren't happy, but agree to arm the Kushat people with some of their advanced weaponry.
Except they don't, they aren't weapons of war. They have decided to end their days in a frenzied game of hunting and destroying humans and each other. After using the weapons, Stark has woken naked and unarmed, and is being herded. The talisman is destroyed by Hrillin.
Finally he finds the body of Rogain, and a sword. Not long after he encounters Ciaran, similarly armed, and he realised Hrillin knows they are enemies, and wants them to fight for their amusement. This pair of warriors has other plans, looking to breakout and fight their way to shutting down the mechanisms that keep the cold of the city at bay, allowing their antagonists' existence.
With the promise of power from this city gone, Stark makes a deal with Ciaran if she will take her army and leave, letting the Kushat people have their city back.
4 out of 5
Globed weapons : People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
Not a good idea to use, as they are not what they seem.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
The old race : People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
Golden skinned and large eyed, with thumb spurs.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Talisman : People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
A crystal lens, some four inches across with an intricate interlocking of many
facets. Ban Cruach's, and contains his knowledge.
4 out of 5
facets. Ban Cruach's, and contains his knowledge.
4 out of 5
Narrisan : People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
The city that is Ciaran's eventual conqueror's goal.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Quarter of the Tomb-Robbers : People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
In Kushat. Quarter of the Blessed, a burying ground.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
The Festival Stones : People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
Two miles northeast of Kushat.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Jekkara and Valkis and Barrakesh : People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
Southern cities of Mars.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Gates of Death : People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
A pass that opens into the black mountains beyond Kushat. Domain of Ban Cruach.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Kushat : People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
Where Stark is heading. A city in the Martian north. The King City.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Thanis : People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
A Kushat girl who helps Stark. Balin's sister.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Saturday, May 15, 2010
Eric John Stark : People of the Talisman - Leigh Brackett
N'Chaka, the Man-Without-a-Tribe. Earthman, out of Mercury.
5 out of 5
5 out of 5
Black Amazon of Mars - Leigh Brackett
Novella
Number of words : 23900
Percent of complex words : 5.3
Average syllables per word : 1.4
Average words per sentence : 15.3
READABILITY INDICES
Fog : 8.3
Flesch : 76.5
Flesch-Kincaid : 6.4
PEOPLE
Eric John Stark
N'Chaka, the Man-Without-a-Tribe. Earthman, out of Mercury.
Camar
A dying Martian.
Ciaran
The warlord Ciara, Black Amazon of Mars.
Ban Cruach
A great Martian king of old.
Thord
Leader of the Riders of Mekh.
Otar
One of Ciaran's men. Elderly and crazed.
Thanis
A Kushat girl who helps Stark. Balin's sister.
Lugh
The military leader in Kushat.
Balin
A soldier of Kushat. Thanis' brother.
Rogain
A noble in Kushat.
Tika
A girl Stark knew in his youth.
PLACES
Norland
A Martian desert region.
Kushat
Where Stark is heading. A city in the Martian north.
Thieves' Quarter
Where Camar was born.
Gates of Death
A pass that opens into the black mountains beyond Kushat. Domain of Ban Cruach.
Babylon
Ancient Earth city.
Phobos and Deimos
The moons of Mars.
Jekkara and Valkis and Barrakesh
Southern cities of Mars.
CONCEPTS
Lord of Silence
A deity.
High Martian
Ancient dialect.
TECHNOLOGY
Talisman
A crystal lens, some four inches across with an intricate interlocking of many
facets. Ban Cruach's, and contains his knowledge.
Crystal Globes
Ancient technology, used for heat blocking.
Master-bank
Technology of the ice-folk.
ORGANISATIONS
Riders of Mekh
Ciaran's barbarian warriors.
RACES
Ice-folk
Shining faceless ones. The kings of the glacial ice of ages past. Banished by Ban Cruach.
WEAPONS
Ban Cruach's sword
Worries the ice-folk.
PLOT
Stark's friend Camar has taken the Talisman of Ban Cruach, and wants to take it back to Kushat. However, he has been mortally wounded, so passes it on to Stark.
Stark runs into a problem when he encounters the Riders of Merkh - a barbarian horde under the command of Lord Ciaran. He is brought in front of the lord, who shows both intelligence and brutality, but he manages to escape and make it to Kushat. Despite two of the locals, a brother and sister believing him, those in charge do not believe in barbarian hordes at the gate.
Hence, unprepared and despite Stark's effort, Kushat will soon be overrun. Stark decides to lead a charge, however, futile, and heads straight for Ciaran. They clash on horseback, both losing their weapons. This brings Stark an advantage in size as they grapple - and even more so when he realises Ciaran is actually female. She still has a good punch though, knocking Stark back.
Her own men are shocked by this revelation, but she declares he accomplishments, and when they waver she rides into them, slaughtering several. So the new boss is the as the old boss. Stark gets away in this confusion. Fascinated, however, he seeks her out in her new chambers in Kushat.
She says will eve go beyond the Gates of Death - and knows that Stark has the talisman.
Thanis' brother Balin has gone to the Gates of Death, which is very bad if in his anger at his city's loss he looses what Ban Cruach stived to hold in check. The coming of the ice-folk again.
Both Stark and Ciara are too brave to see the city go this way, even if it is not hers, and they head out to try and find Balin. There they find ancient super science and the old, cold race, and Ban Cruach's sword.
It is up to Stark to use the talisman and Ban Cruach's knowledge within to hold back this old anyway, and save Balin and Ciara.
5 out of 5
http://www.archive.org/details/BlackAmazonOfMars
http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/3/2/6/6/32665/32665-h/32665-h.htm
Number of words : 23900
Percent of complex words : 5.3
Average syllables per word : 1.4
Average words per sentence : 15.3
READABILITY INDICES
Fog : 8.3
Flesch : 76.5
Flesch-Kincaid : 6.4
PEOPLE
Eric John Stark
N'Chaka, the Man-Without-a-Tribe. Earthman, out of Mercury.
Camar
A dying Martian.
Ciaran
The warlord Ciara, Black Amazon of Mars.
Ban Cruach
A great Martian king of old.
Thord
Leader of the Riders of Mekh.
Otar
One of Ciaran's men. Elderly and crazed.
Thanis
A Kushat girl who helps Stark. Balin's sister.
Lugh
The military leader in Kushat.
Balin
A soldier of Kushat. Thanis' brother.
Rogain
A noble in Kushat.
Tika
A girl Stark knew in his youth.
PLACES
Norland
A Martian desert region.
Kushat
Where Stark is heading. A city in the Martian north.
Thieves' Quarter
Where Camar was born.
Gates of Death
A pass that opens into the black mountains beyond Kushat. Domain of Ban Cruach.
Babylon
Ancient Earth city.
Phobos and Deimos
The moons of Mars.
Jekkara and Valkis and Barrakesh
Southern cities of Mars.
CONCEPTS
Lord of Silence
A deity.
High Martian
Ancient dialect.
TECHNOLOGY
Talisman
A crystal lens, some four inches across with an intricate interlocking of many
facets. Ban Cruach's, and contains his knowledge.
Crystal Globes
Ancient technology, used for heat blocking.
Master-bank
Technology of the ice-folk.
ORGANISATIONS
Riders of Mekh
Ciaran's barbarian warriors.
RACES
Ice-folk
Shining faceless ones. The kings of the glacial ice of ages past. Banished by Ban Cruach.
WEAPONS
Ban Cruach's sword
Worries the ice-folk.
PLOT
Stark's friend Camar has taken the Talisman of Ban Cruach, and wants to take it back to Kushat. However, he has been mortally wounded, so passes it on to Stark.
Stark runs into a problem when he encounters the Riders of Merkh - a barbarian horde under the command of Lord Ciaran. He is brought in front of the lord, who shows both intelligence and brutality, but he manages to escape and make it to Kushat. Despite two of the locals, a brother and sister believing him, those in charge do not believe in barbarian hordes at the gate.
Hence, unprepared and despite Stark's effort, Kushat will soon be overrun. Stark decides to lead a charge, however, futile, and heads straight for Ciaran. They clash on horseback, both losing their weapons. This brings Stark an advantage in size as they grapple - and even more so when he realises Ciaran is actually female. She still has a good punch though, knocking Stark back.
Her own men are shocked by this revelation, but she declares he accomplishments, and when they waver she rides into them, slaughtering several. So the new boss is the as the old boss. Stark gets away in this confusion. Fascinated, however, he seeks her out in her new chambers in Kushat.
She says will eve go beyond the Gates of Death - and knows that Stark has the talisman.
Thanis' brother Balin has gone to the Gates of Death, which is very bad if in his anger at his city's loss he looses what Ban Cruach stived to hold in check. The coming of the ice-folk again.
Both Stark and Ciara are too brave to see the city go this way, even if it is not hers, and they head out to try and find Balin. There they find ancient super science and the old, cold race, and Ban Cruach's sword.
It is up to Stark to use the talisman and Ban Cruach's knowledge within to hold back this old anyway, and save Balin and Ciara.
5 out of 5
http://www.archive.org/details/BlackAmazonOfMars
http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/3/2/6/6/32665/32665-h/32665-h.htm
Ice-folk : Black Amazon of Mars - Leigh Brackett
Shining faceless ones. The kings of the glacial ice of ages past. Banished by
Ban Cruach.
4 out of 5
Ban Cruach.
4 out of 5
Crystal Globes : Black Amazon of Mars - Leigh Brackett
Ancient technology, used for heat blocking.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Talisman : Black Amazon of Mars - Leigh Brackett
A crystal lens, some four inches across with an intricate interlocking of many
facets. Ban Cruach's, and contains his knowledge.
4 out of 5
facets. Ban Cruach's, and contains his knowledge.
4 out of 5
Jekkara and Valkis and Barrakesh : Black Amazon of Mars - Leigh Brackett
Southern cities of Mars.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Gates of Death : Black Amazon of Mars - Leigh Brackett
A pass that opens into the black mountains beyond Kushat. Domain of Ban Cruach.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Kushat : Black Amazon of Mars - Leigh Brackett
Where Stark is heading. A city in the Martian north.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Thanis : Black Amazon of Mars - Leigh Brackett
A Kushat girl who helps Stark. Balin's sister.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Eric John Stark : Black Amazon of Mars - Leigh Brackett
N'Chaka, the Man-Without-a-Tribe. Earthman, out of Mercury.
5 out of 5
5 out of 5
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Leigh Brackett, screenwriter and sci-fi royalty - Marc Haefele
A short article from a Southern California public radio station. Also with an audio version you can download.
3.5 out of 5
http://media.scpr.org/audio/upload/2010/04/29/or-haefele-brackett.mp3
http://www.scpr.org/programs/offramp/2010/05/01/marc-haefele-leigh-brackett-screenwriter-and-sci-f/
3.5 out of 5
http://media.scpr.org/audio/upload/2010/04/29/or-haefele-brackett.mp3
http://www.scpr.org/programs/offramp/2010/05/01/marc-haefele-leigh-brackett-screenwriter-and-sci-f/
Sunday, May 2, 2010
The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Novella
Number of words : 28000
Percent of complex words : 5.4
Average syllables per word : 1.4
Average words per sentence : 12.4
READABILITY INDICES
Fog : 7.1
Flesch : 78.2
Flesch-Kincaid : 5.4
PEOPLE
Eric John Stark
N'Chaka, oh Man-without-a-tribe who is on the run. Gets to be an agent.
Simon Ashton
Stark's friend and mentor who has a deal for him he can't say no to.
Kynon
A barbarian chieftain from Shun. The Giver of Life.
Delgaun
A bandit, and one of the System's top criminals.
Knighton
Terran bandit. Owner of a fast cruiser.
Walsh
Terran bandit. A genius weaponeer.
Themis
Mercurian bandit. Also a mechanic.
Arrod
Callistan bandit and organised crime leader.
Luthar
Venusian bandit. A cashiered officer of the Venusian Guards. Has worked with and betrayed Stark before.
Berild
Raman woman, allied with Kynon.
Tika
Girl Stark knew, killed by a giant bird.
Freka
Kynon's captain and indulger in Shanga.
Fianna
Rama woman who is sick of the lifestyle and hates Kynon.
Kala
Old woman, owner of Kala's.
PLACES
Valkis
Martian Low Canal town.
Barrakesh
Martian Low Canal town.
Tarak
Where the Earth Commission offices are located. On the Dryland Border.
Kesh
Martian drylands area.
Shun
Martian drylands area.
Kala's
Bar in Valkis.
Belly of Stones
Ancient underground place with a secret water supply, where Stark and Berild shelter from a desert storm.
Twilight Belt
Habitable zone on Mercury.
Sinharat
Rallying point for the tribes and Kynon's plans for war. Has Catacombs.
TECHNOLOGY
Venusian spider silk
Used for making clothes.
Crowns of the Ramas
Used for mind transfer. Or so it is said.
Purcell electronic discharge
Useful for fake shows.
Shanga
The going-back drug. Makes people more primitive.
WEAPONS
Banning
An electrical gun.
ORGANISATIONS
Earth Police Control
Hunters of Stark.
Terro-Venusian Metals
A company Stark opposed.
The Martian Council of City-States
Martian government organisation.
Earth Commission
Earth government organisation related to Mars.
Venusian Guards
Venus military group.
Brotherhood of the Little Worlds
Organised crime on the smaller planetary bodies.
Space Patrol
Police organisation, whom the Brotherhood drove nuts.
RACES
Middle Venusians
Martian swamp dwellers.
Ramas
Ancient Martian serial immortals. The Twice Born.
Keshi
Martian barbarians.
CONCEPT
Banner of Death and Life
Kynon's rallying flag.
PLOT
Simon Ashton and his posse catch up to Eric John Stark, his former mentee and almost-son.
Stark has a long stretch in the slammer hanging over his head, so Ashton offers him a deal. Be his agent in trying to break up the plans Kynon and Delgaun have for provoking an inter-regional war, and the slate is wiped clean.
Stark does so and discovers at the heart of it, along with several crimelords are a pair of women. Both take an interest in him, and Fianna wants to aid him.
Stark has an enemy in Luhar, who sold him out when he was doing some gunrunning for some locals. Therefore, they try and set him up at Kala's when he is tasked with retrieving one of Kynon's captains, Freka, from his overindulgence in Shanga. Or, Wild Man vs Beastial Men.
The woman Berild also takes an interest in Stark, growing tired of Kynon, and has her own plans. She is trapped in a desert storm with Stark, who helps her to survive, along with her knowledge of a secret underground water supply.
At Sinharat, Stark discovers that the ancient Rama race remnants are at the heart of this conspiracy, including Berild, Delgaun and Fianna. When Kynon realises he has been manipulated, he turns on his allies, with Stark. Fianna takes the Raman personality switching Crowns to hide, telling Stark that if he is tired of growing old, to come and find her, as she can't bring herself to destroy them, in case she wants to use them again.
4 out of 5
Number of words : 28000
Percent of complex words : 5.4
Average syllables per word : 1.4
Average words per sentence : 12.4
READABILITY INDICES
Fog : 7.1
Flesch : 78.2
Flesch-Kincaid : 5.4
PEOPLE
Eric John Stark
N'Chaka, oh Man-without-a-tribe who is on the run. Gets to be an agent.
Simon Ashton
Stark's friend and mentor who has a deal for him he can't say no to.
Kynon
A barbarian chieftain from Shun. The Giver of Life.
Delgaun
A bandit, and one of the System's top criminals.
Knighton
Terran bandit. Owner of a fast cruiser.
Walsh
Terran bandit. A genius weaponeer.
Themis
Mercurian bandit. Also a mechanic.
Arrod
Callistan bandit and organised crime leader.
Luthar
Venusian bandit. A cashiered officer of the Venusian Guards. Has worked with and betrayed Stark before.
Berild
Raman woman, allied with Kynon.
Tika
Girl Stark knew, killed by a giant bird.
Freka
Kynon's captain and indulger in Shanga.
Fianna
Rama woman who is sick of the lifestyle and hates Kynon.
Kala
Old woman, owner of Kala's.
PLACES
Valkis
Martian Low Canal town.
Barrakesh
Martian Low Canal town.
Tarak
Where the Earth Commission offices are located. On the Dryland Border.
Kesh
Martian drylands area.
Shun
Martian drylands area.
Kala's
Bar in Valkis.
Belly of Stones
Ancient underground place with a secret water supply, where Stark and Berild shelter from a desert storm.
Twilight Belt
Habitable zone on Mercury.
Sinharat
Rallying point for the tribes and Kynon's plans for war. Has Catacombs.
TECHNOLOGY
Venusian spider silk
Used for making clothes.
Crowns of the Ramas
Used for mind transfer. Or so it is said.
Purcell electronic discharge
Useful for fake shows.
Shanga
The going-back drug. Makes people more primitive.
WEAPONS
Banning
An electrical gun.
ORGANISATIONS
Earth Police Control
Hunters of Stark.
Terro-Venusian Metals
A company Stark opposed.
The Martian Council of City-States
Martian government organisation.
Earth Commission
Earth government organisation related to Mars.
Venusian Guards
Venus military group.
Brotherhood of the Little Worlds
Organised crime on the smaller planetary bodies.
Space Patrol
Police organisation, whom the Brotherhood drove nuts.
RACES
Middle Venusians
Martian swamp dwellers.
Ramas
Ancient Martian serial immortals. The Twice Born.
Keshi
Martian barbarians.
CONCEPT
Banner of Death and Life
Kynon's rallying flag.
PLOT
Simon Ashton and his posse catch up to Eric John Stark, his former mentee and almost-son.
Stark has a long stretch in the slammer hanging over his head, so Ashton offers him a deal. Be his agent in trying to break up the plans Kynon and Delgaun have for provoking an inter-regional war, and the slate is wiped clean.
Stark does so and discovers at the heart of it, along with several crimelords are a pair of women. Both take an interest in him, and Fianna wants to aid him.
Stark has an enemy in Luhar, who sold him out when he was doing some gunrunning for some locals. Therefore, they try and set him up at Kala's when he is tasked with retrieving one of Kynon's captains, Freka, from his overindulgence in Shanga. Or, Wild Man vs Beastial Men.
The woman Berild also takes an interest in Stark, growing tired of Kynon, and has her own plans. She is trapped in a desert storm with Stark, who helps her to survive, along with her knowledge of a secret underground water supply.
At Sinharat, Stark discovers that the ancient Rama race remnants are at the heart of this conspiracy, including Berild, Delgaun and Fianna. When Kynon realises he has been manipulated, he turns on his allies, with Stark. Fianna takes the Raman personality switching Crowns to hide, telling Stark that if he is tired of growing old, to come and find her, as she can't bring herself to destroy them, in case she wants to use them again.
4 out of 5
Ramas : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Ancient Martian serial immortals. The Twice Born.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Space Patrol : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh BrackettSpace Patrol : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Police organisation, whom the Brotherhood drove nuts.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Brotherhood of the Little Worlds : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Organised crime on the smaller planetary bodies.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Earth Commission : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Earth government organisation related to Mars.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
The Martian Council of City-States : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Martian government organisation.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Shanga : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
The going-back drug. Makes people more primitive.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Purcell electronic discharge : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Useful for fake shows.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Crowns of the Ramas : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Used for mind transfer. Or so it is said.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Sinharat : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Rallying point for the tribes and Kynon's plans for war. Has Catacombs.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Belly of Stones : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Ancient underground place with a secret water supply, where Stark and Berild shelter from a desert storm.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Tarak : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Where the Earth Commission offices are located. On the Dryland Border.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Fianna : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Rama woman who is sick of the lifestyle and hates Kynon.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Luthar : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Venusian bandit. A cashiered officer of the Venusian Guards. Has worked with and betrayed Stark before.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Arrod : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Callistan bandit and organised crime leader.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Knighton : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Terran bandit. Owner of a fast cruiser.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Delgaun : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
A bandit, and one of the System's top criminals.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Kynon : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
A barbarian chieftain from Shun. The Giver of Life.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Simon Ashton : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
Stark's friend and mentor who has a deal for him he can't say no to.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Eric John Stark : The Secret of Sinharat - Leigh Brackett
N'Chaka, oh Man-without-a-tribe who is on the run. Gets to be an agent.
5 out of 5
5 out of 5
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Wikipedia - People of the Talisman
People of the Talisman
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia People of the Talisman
Cover of first edition.
Author Leigh Brackett
Country United States
Language English
Genre(s) Science fiction Fantasy novel
Publisher Ace Books
Publication date 1964
Media type Print (Paperback)
Pages 128 pp
ISBN NA
Preceded by The Secret of Sinharat
People of the Talisman is a science fiction novel by Leigh Brackett set on the planet Mars, whose protagonist is Eric John Stark.Contents [hide]
1 Plot introduction
2 Plot summary
2.1 Black Amazon of Mars
2.2 People of the Talisman
2.3 Expansion Commentary
3 Characters
4 Publication history
5 Titles
6 Footnotes
7 References
[edit]
Plot introduction
Despite beginning in the same place and with the same situation, Black Amazon of Mars and People of the Talisman are two different stories on a similar premise, with occasionally overlapping text. The differences between the two can be seen in the following synopses.
[edit]
Plot summary
[edit]
Black Amazon of Mars
Chapter 1 - Eric John Stark, outland mercenary, and his companion Camar the thief, are travelling in the wilderness that surrounds the northern polar cap of Mars, trying to get to Camar's home city of Kushat. Camar has been mortally wounded in a guerrilla campaign and wants to return home before he dies. Unable to make it, he confesses that he has stolen the holy talisman of Ban Cruach from Kushat, which keeps the city safe. It is hidden inside a boss on his belt. Stark promises to take the talisman back to Kushat for Camar. Examining the talisman, he presses it to his forehead and receives visions of a tower, a city in the ice, and a pass - the memories of Ban Cruach. Soon after he puts the talisman back in the belt, he is approached by the riders of Mekh, a barbarian tribe that lives in the hills between him and Kushat.
Chapter 2 - The riders of Mekh arrest and plunder Stark, except for his clothes and Camar's belt. They lead him to their camp in a valley several days northward. There they bring him before the masked and fully armored lord Ciaran. Ciaran interrogates Stark and announces his plan to besiege Kushat. Stark is uncooperative and demands to see Ciaran's face. Ciaran turns him over to Thord, his previous capturer.
Chapter 3 - Stark is tied to a scaffold and scourged by Thord. When Thord comes near him, Stark bits his hand hard enough to break his thumb. When Thord tries to kill Stark for this, Ciaran kills Thord for disobedience. Stark feigns unconsciousness, despite being prodded by spears. When he is cut down, Stark gets a spear, kills several riders, and escapes on a mount. After riding for three days through a snowy wasteland marked by a series of towers, he reaches Kushat, a city standing in front of a pass through a scarp.
Chapter 4 - Stark enters Kushat and meets Thanis. He his challenged by Lugh, whom he warns about the imminent attack by Mekh. Lugh leads Stark to the guard captain, who dismisses Stark's claims, but is persuaded to pass the warning on to the nobility. He gives Stark into the custody of Thanis, who takes him to her home. Stark sleeps, only to be wakened by Thanis' brother Balin, who tells him that soldiers have come, and warns him not to speak of the talisman. A nobleman, Rogain, enters with a group of soldiers and questions Stark about the invasion. Rogain at last agrees to put Kushat in arms. After Rogain and his men leave, Balin and Thanis explain that they found the talisman in Camar's belt, and they agree not to return it to the men of Kushat. Stark goes to sleep again. Just before dawn he wakes and goes up on Kushat's wall.
Chapter 5 - In the morning, the clans of Mekh, led by Ciaran, attack Kushat. Despite resistance, Mekh takes the Wall and breaches its gate. Stark, who had been fighting on the wall, goes down to face Ciaran in single combat. As they fight, Stark tears Ciaran's mask off, revealing her to be a red-haired woman.
Chapter 6 - Despite this revelation, in the moment of victory, Ciaran is able to retain the loyalty of her followers. As the soldiers of Kushat charge and are beaten back, Stark manages to escape the mêlée. Stark hides in Kushat until the looting commences.
Chapter 7 -
Chapter 8 -
Chapter 9 -
[edit]
People of the Talisman
Chapter 1 - Eric John Stark, outland mercenary, and his companion Camar the thief, are travelling in the wilderness that surrounds the northern polar cap of Mars, trying to get to Camar's home city of Kushat. Camar has been mortally wounded in a guerrilla campaign and wants to return home before he dies. Unable to make it, he confesses that he has stolen the holy talisman of Ban Cruach from Kushat, which keeps the city safe. It is hidden inside a boss on his belt. Stark promises to take the talisman back to Kushat for Camar. Examining the talisman, he hears tiny, unintelligible voices that alarm him. Soon after he puts the talisman back in the belt, he is approached by the riders of Mekh, a barbarian tribe that lives in the hills between him and Kushat.
Chapter 2 -
Chapter 3 -
Chapter 4 -
Chapter 5 -
Chapter 6 -
Chapter 7 -
Chapter 8 -
Chapter 9 -
Chapter 10 -
Chapter 11 -
Chapter 12 -
Chapter 13 -
Chapter 14 -
Chapter 15 -
[edit]
Expansion Commentary
The Talisman expansion is far more ambitious than the one of The Secret of Sinharat; for one thing, the resulting story is about a third longer than Sinharat. Despite the comprehensiveness of the revision, the treatment of the earlier chapters, where more of the original text is retained, is sometimes clumsy and the motivation of the changes is sometimes unclear. In at least one place there is a significant editorial faux pas -- a passage in which an important character is introduced is omitted, and the character is later referred to by name without the connection between name and person having ever been made explicit. The murderously insane aliens of Talisman are a very unusual invention for Brackett, and it may be that the hand of Hamilton is seen at work here. Ban Cruach also loses much of his mythical glamor in Talisman, which is something of a let-down, though it does work as a "twist" conclusion.
[edit]
Characters
Eric John Stark, a mercenary fighter, born on Mercury, looking for trouble in northern Mars.
Camar, a Martian thief of the northern city of Kushat.
Ciaran, lord of the barbarian tribe of Mekh, who keeps some secret forever hidden behind his mask.
Thord, captain of Mekh, servant of Ciaran.
Otar, of Kushat, counselor and servant of Ciaran.
Lugh, officer of the guard of Kushat.
Rogain, nobleman of Kushat and Commander of the City.
Balin, a thief of Kushat.
Thanis, Balin's sister.
Ban Cruach, a hero of ancient Mars, standing forever at the Gates of Death in the Norland wilderness.
[edit]
Publication history
This story was first published under the title Black Amazon of Mars in the pulp magazine Planet Stories, March 1951.
In 1964, after a total revision and expansion, it was republished as People of the Talisman, as one part of an Ace Double novel; its companion was another expanded Eric John Stark story, The Secret of Sinharat. The expansion has sometimes been attributed to Brackett's husband, Edmond Hamilton[1]. For People of the Talisman, there may be some internal evidence to support this suggestion.
In 1982, it appeared, again together with The Secret of Sinharat, under the title Eric John Stark, Outlaw of Mars.
In 2005 the original Planet Stories version was republished in Sea-Kings of Mars and Otherworldly Stories, Volume 46 in the Gollancz Fantasy Masterworks series. It appeared the same year in the collection Stark and the Star Kings (Haffner Press).
[edit]
Titles
Black Amazon of Mars is typical of the rather wordy and sometimes misleading titles assigned to stories in Planet Stories, to go along with their colorful, action-packed, but equally misleading cover art. The cover of the March 1951 issue of Planet Stories gives the title as Black Amazon of Mars: A Novel of Warrior Worlds by Leigh Brackett, with the explanatory blurb A hooded warlord leads the hordes of Mekh against the Ancient Doom. Although not very revealing of anything about the plot, it is slightly more accurate than some of Planet Stories' other blurbs.
The "Black Amazon" in question is of course Ciaran/Ciara, whose role in the story is for once central enough to justify Planet's title, and its choice of her as the center of its cover. The Allen Anderson cover of the March 1951 issue shows a dramatically tilted red-haired woman in black mail swinging a double-bitted battle-axe at a mass of waving black tentacles emerging from the ground. The tentacles are apparently a wild stab by the artist at giving some form to the almost undepictable aliens of the story. An inappropriately pale-skinned Stark, looking rather like Mickey Mouse in red shorts and suspenders, is shown in the background futilely waving a sword about. The further background somewhat more convincingly depicts Ban Cruach at the Gates of Death.
The later title, People of the Talisman at least has the merit of not giving away an important plot point prematurely. Otherwise, it is rather vague; it might refer either to the people of Kushat, or the aliens beyond the Gates of Death, in either case excluding the two main characters!
[edit]
Footnotes
[edit]
References
Tuck, Donald H. (1974). The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Chicago: Advent. p. 61. ISBN 0-911682-20-1.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia People of the Talisman
Cover of first edition.
Author Leigh Brackett
Country United States
Language English
Genre(s) Science fiction Fantasy novel
Publisher Ace Books
Publication date 1964
Media type Print (Paperback)
Pages 128 pp
ISBN NA
Preceded by The Secret of Sinharat
People of the Talisman is a science fiction novel by Leigh Brackett set on the planet Mars, whose protagonist is Eric John Stark.Contents [hide]
1 Plot introduction
2 Plot summary
2.1 Black Amazon of Mars
2.2 People of the Talisman
2.3 Expansion Commentary
3 Characters
4 Publication history
5 Titles
6 Footnotes
7 References
[edit]
Plot introduction
Despite beginning in the same place and with the same situation, Black Amazon of Mars and People of the Talisman are two different stories on a similar premise, with occasionally overlapping text. The differences between the two can be seen in the following synopses.
[edit]
Plot summary
[edit]
Black Amazon of Mars
Chapter 1 - Eric John Stark, outland mercenary, and his companion Camar the thief, are travelling in the wilderness that surrounds the northern polar cap of Mars, trying to get to Camar's home city of Kushat. Camar has been mortally wounded in a guerrilla campaign and wants to return home before he dies. Unable to make it, he confesses that he has stolen the holy talisman of Ban Cruach from Kushat, which keeps the city safe. It is hidden inside a boss on his belt. Stark promises to take the talisman back to Kushat for Camar. Examining the talisman, he presses it to his forehead and receives visions of a tower, a city in the ice, and a pass - the memories of Ban Cruach. Soon after he puts the talisman back in the belt, he is approached by the riders of Mekh, a barbarian tribe that lives in the hills between him and Kushat.
Chapter 2 - The riders of Mekh arrest and plunder Stark, except for his clothes and Camar's belt. They lead him to their camp in a valley several days northward. There they bring him before the masked and fully armored lord Ciaran. Ciaran interrogates Stark and announces his plan to besiege Kushat. Stark is uncooperative and demands to see Ciaran's face. Ciaran turns him over to Thord, his previous capturer.
Chapter 3 - Stark is tied to a scaffold and scourged by Thord. When Thord comes near him, Stark bits his hand hard enough to break his thumb. When Thord tries to kill Stark for this, Ciaran kills Thord for disobedience. Stark feigns unconsciousness, despite being prodded by spears. When he is cut down, Stark gets a spear, kills several riders, and escapes on a mount. After riding for three days through a snowy wasteland marked by a series of towers, he reaches Kushat, a city standing in front of a pass through a scarp.
Chapter 4 - Stark enters Kushat and meets Thanis. He his challenged by Lugh, whom he warns about the imminent attack by Mekh. Lugh leads Stark to the guard captain, who dismisses Stark's claims, but is persuaded to pass the warning on to the nobility. He gives Stark into the custody of Thanis, who takes him to her home. Stark sleeps, only to be wakened by Thanis' brother Balin, who tells him that soldiers have come, and warns him not to speak of the talisman. A nobleman, Rogain, enters with a group of soldiers and questions Stark about the invasion. Rogain at last agrees to put Kushat in arms. After Rogain and his men leave, Balin and Thanis explain that they found the talisman in Camar's belt, and they agree not to return it to the men of Kushat. Stark goes to sleep again. Just before dawn he wakes and goes up on Kushat's wall.
Chapter 5 - In the morning, the clans of Mekh, led by Ciaran, attack Kushat. Despite resistance, Mekh takes the Wall and breaches its gate. Stark, who had been fighting on the wall, goes down to face Ciaran in single combat. As they fight, Stark tears Ciaran's mask off, revealing her to be a red-haired woman.
Chapter 6 - Despite this revelation, in the moment of victory, Ciaran is able to retain the loyalty of her followers. As the soldiers of Kushat charge and are beaten back, Stark manages to escape the mêlée. Stark hides in Kushat until the looting commences.
Chapter 7 -
Chapter 8 -
Chapter 9 -
[edit]
People of the Talisman
Chapter 1 - Eric John Stark, outland mercenary, and his companion Camar the thief, are travelling in the wilderness that surrounds the northern polar cap of Mars, trying to get to Camar's home city of Kushat. Camar has been mortally wounded in a guerrilla campaign and wants to return home before he dies. Unable to make it, he confesses that he has stolen the holy talisman of Ban Cruach from Kushat, which keeps the city safe. It is hidden inside a boss on his belt. Stark promises to take the talisman back to Kushat for Camar. Examining the talisman, he hears tiny, unintelligible voices that alarm him. Soon after he puts the talisman back in the belt, he is approached by the riders of Mekh, a barbarian tribe that lives in the hills between him and Kushat.
Chapter 2 -
Chapter 3 -
Chapter 4 -
Chapter 5 -
Chapter 6 -
Chapter 7 -
Chapter 8 -
Chapter 9 -
Chapter 10 -
Chapter 11 -
Chapter 12 -
Chapter 13 -
Chapter 14 -
Chapter 15 -
[edit]
Expansion Commentary
The Talisman expansion is far more ambitious than the one of The Secret of Sinharat; for one thing, the resulting story is about a third longer than Sinharat. Despite the comprehensiveness of the revision, the treatment of the earlier chapters, where more of the original text is retained, is sometimes clumsy and the motivation of the changes is sometimes unclear. In at least one place there is a significant editorial faux pas -- a passage in which an important character is introduced is omitted, and the character is later referred to by name without the connection between name and person having ever been made explicit. The murderously insane aliens of Talisman are a very unusual invention for Brackett, and it may be that the hand of Hamilton is seen at work here. Ban Cruach also loses much of his mythical glamor in Talisman, which is something of a let-down, though it does work as a "twist" conclusion.
[edit]
Characters
Eric John Stark, a mercenary fighter, born on Mercury, looking for trouble in northern Mars.
Camar, a Martian thief of the northern city of Kushat.
Ciaran, lord of the barbarian tribe of Mekh, who keeps some secret forever hidden behind his mask.
Thord, captain of Mekh, servant of Ciaran.
Otar, of Kushat, counselor and servant of Ciaran.
Lugh, officer of the guard of Kushat.
Rogain, nobleman of Kushat and Commander of the City.
Balin, a thief of Kushat.
Thanis, Balin's sister.
Ban Cruach, a hero of ancient Mars, standing forever at the Gates of Death in the Norland wilderness.
[edit]
Publication history
This story was first published under the title Black Amazon of Mars in the pulp magazine Planet Stories, March 1951.
In 1964, after a total revision and expansion, it was republished as People of the Talisman, as one part of an Ace Double novel; its companion was another expanded Eric John Stark story, The Secret of Sinharat. The expansion has sometimes been attributed to Brackett's husband, Edmond Hamilton[1]. For People of the Talisman, there may be some internal evidence to support this suggestion.
In 1982, it appeared, again together with The Secret of Sinharat, under the title Eric John Stark, Outlaw of Mars.
In 2005 the original Planet Stories version was republished in Sea-Kings of Mars and Otherworldly Stories, Volume 46 in the Gollancz Fantasy Masterworks series. It appeared the same year in the collection Stark and the Star Kings (Haffner Press).
[edit]
Titles
Black Amazon of Mars is typical of the rather wordy and sometimes misleading titles assigned to stories in Planet Stories, to go along with their colorful, action-packed, but equally misleading cover art. The cover of the March 1951 issue of Planet Stories gives the title as Black Amazon of Mars: A Novel of Warrior Worlds by Leigh Brackett, with the explanatory blurb A hooded warlord leads the hordes of Mekh against the Ancient Doom. Although not very revealing of anything about the plot, it is slightly more accurate than some of Planet Stories' other blurbs.
The "Black Amazon" in question is of course Ciaran/Ciara, whose role in the story is for once central enough to justify Planet's title, and its choice of her as the center of its cover. The Allen Anderson cover of the March 1951 issue shows a dramatically tilted red-haired woman in black mail swinging a double-bitted battle-axe at a mass of waving black tentacles emerging from the ground. The tentacles are apparently a wild stab by the artist at giving some form to the almost undepictable aliens of the story. An inappropriately pale-skinned Stark, looking rather like Mickey Mouse in red shorts and suspenders, is shown in the background futilely waving a sword about. The further background somewhat more convincingly depicts Ban Cruach at the Gates of Death.
The later title, People of the Talisman at least has the merit of not giving away an important plot point prematurely. Otherwise, it is rather vague; it might refer either to the people of Kushat, or the aliens beyond the Gates of Death, in either case excluding the two main characters!
[edit]
Footnotes
[edit]
References
Tuck, Donald H. (1974). The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Chicago: Advent. p. 61. ISBN 0-911682-20-1.
Wikipedia - The Secret of Sinharat
The Secret of Sinharat
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia The Secret of Sinharat
Cover of first edition.
Author Leigh Brackett
Country United States
Language English
Genre(s) Science fiction novel
Publisher Ace Books
Publication date 1964
Media type Print (Paperback)
Pages 95 pp
ISBN NA
Followed by People of the Talisman
The Secret of Sinharat is a science fiction novel by Leigh Brackett set on the planet Mars, whose protagonist is Eric John Stark.Contents [hide]
1 Plot summary
1.1 Queen of the Martian Catacombs
1.2 The Secret of Sinharat
1.3 Expansion Commentary
2 Characters
3 Publication history
4 Titles
5 Footnotes
6 References
7 External links
[edit]
Plot summary
For the first seven chapters, Queen of the Martian Catacombs and The Secret of Sinharat are almost word-for-word identical; the differences are inconsequential to the plot. In Chapter 1, a brief paragraph is inserted to situate the reader in the Leigh Brackett Solar System and to excuse the presence of non-Terran humans on planets like Mars through the concept of a prehistoric "seeding" - not mentioned elsewhere in Brackett's novels. In Chapter 5, an explicit reference to the events of Brackett's story The Beast-Jewel of Mars (Planet Stories, Winter 1948) has been cut, perhaps on the assumption that readers of the novel would not know or be interested in the earlier story. The Arabic word khamsin is consistently replaced by "storm wind", perhaps on the grounds that readers might not be familiar with the word (or mistake it for a Martian technical term).
Chapter 1 - Eric John Stark, fleeing from Venus where he has been running guns to native opponents of a Terro-Venusian mining concern (mining and mineral extraction companies recur as villains in Brackett's stories), has come to Mars to fight as a mercenary in a private war in the Martian Drylands on behalf of Delgaun, lord of the Martian city of Valkis. He is finally pinned down by agents of Earth Police Control. Their leader, Simon Ashton, offers him a deal: lifting of his sentence, if he agrees to act as a spy on Delgaun, whom Ashton claims is plotting a major war together with a barbarian leader called Kynon, of the Dryland tribe of Shun; a war that Ashton says will be disastrous for the drylanders. Stark agrees to go to Valkis as Ashton's agent, and return to report to him in the Martian city of Tarak.
Chapter 2 - Stark enters Valkis late at night and sees the drylanders gathering there. He meets Delgaun and several other mercenaries that Delgaun has hired. One of them is Luhar, an old enemy of Stark from Venus. They challenge each other, but Delgaun separates them. At dawn, Kynon of Shun enters Valkis.
Chapter 3 - Delgaun, Stark and the mercenaries go to see Kynon. In the public square of Valkis, Kynon demonstrates a technology which he claims to have recovered from the lost secrets of the Ramas, an ancient race of Martians who had acquired a form of immortality. Kynon, using two crystal circlets and a glowing rod, appears to transfer the consciousness of an old Martian man into a young Terran boy. The old man collapses and dies. Kynon returns with Delgaun and the others to the council room in the palace.
Chapter 4 - Stark accuses Kynon of an elaborate charade in which the boy was coached in his part and the old man was killed by poison. Kynon admits it, but justifies it as a necessity for uniting the drylanders against the City-States of the Dryland Borders, who are depriving them of water resources. Together with the men of Valkis and the other Low-canal cities, they will conquer the City-States and become fully independent of Terra. Stark goes to his quarters and sleeps through the day. At dusk he goes to the council-room, and finds Delgaun there with Kynon's female companion, Berild. Delgaun asks Stark to bring back one of Kynon's trusted captains, Freka, who is indulging in "a certain vice"; he needs to be back before Kynon sets out at midnight for his desert headquarters. On his way, Stark is stopped by Fianna, Berild's serving girl, who warns him that he is going into a trap set by Delgaun. Stark accepts the warning, but continues anyway.
Chapter 5 - Stark comes to Kala's, a broken-down dive in a mostly uninhabited part of Valkis. He finds Freka there, indulging in shanga, a radiation-induced temporary atavistic regression to a bestial state. Stark realizes that an empty room near Freka probably contains the trap set for him. When he is refused entrance to the room, he leaves Kala's and waits outside. He is followed by Luhar, who had been waiting in the empty room for a chance to attack Stark. Stark jumps Luhar; the fighting goes back into Kala's, where the shanga addicts and Kala herself become involved. Stark knocks Freka out, is stabbed by Luhar, knocks Luhar out, and returns with Freka to Delgaun's palace. Delgaun is surprised and angry; Berild is pleased.
Chapter 6 - At midnight, Kynon leaves Valkis with the drylanders and mercenaries. Kynon orders Stark and Luhar to remain apart from each other. Delgaun remains behind. Luhar and Freka confer. The caravan proceeds across the desert for three days, and on the fourth day they are hit by a sandstorm.
Chapter 7 - Luhar and Freka take advantage of the storm to jump Stark and leave him for dead. He finds himself together with Berild. When the storm blows out, they are lost in the desert. They proceed on foot. After four days, running out of water, they come to a wilderness of rocks.
From chapter 8 on the two versions diverge.
[edit]
Queen of the Martian Catacombs
Chapter 8 - Stark and Berild are dying of thirst. Berild leads Stark three miles out of their way to a ruined monastery. She miraculously discovers a long-buried well. After they have drunk and slept, Stark suggests to Berild that she is actually a surviving immortal Rama, and knew the location of the well from memory. Berild dismisses the accusation. They stay in the ruins two days, and then leave.
Chapter 9 - Stark and Berild arrive at Sinharat, the old city of the Ramas, where Kynon has made his headquarters. They find Kynon's army and his mercenaries camped in the desert outside the city. Stark enters Sinharat looking for Luhar, and fatally attacks him when he finds him. Delgaun is also mysteriously there. Kynon arrests Stark and places him in a subterranean cell in Sinharat under Freka's guard. Before Freka can kill Stark, Fianna appears and shoots him. Stark disposes of Freka in a pit in the catacombs. Fianna explains that Delgaun and Berild are both Ramas, and that while Kynon wants empire, Delgaun and Berild want to control Mars - without Kynon - through their mercenary outlander clients.
Chapter 10 - Stark and Fianna proceed to a crypt below Sinharat where Berild is waiting. Kynon is there with her, but drugged and under Berild's hypnotic control. Berild offers to become Stark's lover and to make him a Rama, by exchanging his mind with Kynon's, and disposing of Delgaun after the war. Stark agrees, and Berild produces the real crowns of the Ramas, and puts them on Stark's and Kynon's heads.
Chapter 11 - Stark awakes to find himself in Kynon's body. His own body is still there, alive but with Kynon's mind still under hypnosis. Berild locks Kynon, in Stark's body, in a small cell. Stark-as-Kynon goes with Berild to address the armies assembled at Sinharat from a high ledge in the city. Delgaun is there. Instead of leading them to war, Stark reveals the charade of the false Rama crowns. Berild stabs Stark in the back. Stark reveals Berild's treachery to Delgaun. Delgaun throws Berild from the ledge and attempts to unseat Stark from his steed and flee. Stark, though wounded, grasps Delgaun and throttles him, while Delgaun stabs him repeatedly. Stark kills Delgaun and loses consciousness. Fianna runs to him.
Chapter 12 - Stark awakes and finds himself with Fianna. He is back in the crypt below Sinharat, in his own body. Kynon is next to him, dead. Fianna reveals that she is also a Rama, unknown to Berild and Delgaun. She expresses remorse for her past evil and destroys the rod and crowns of the Ramas. Stark and Fianna leave together and find Sinharat deserted. Fianna decides to stay in Sinharat for a while before she decides what to do. Stark departs for Tarak to meet Simon Ashton.
[edit]
The Secret of Sinharat
Chapter 8 - Stark and Berild are dying of thirst. Berild leads Stark three miles out of their way to an old ruin, where they both collapse. At night, Stark wakes to see Berild tracing her steps to the site of a long-buried well. They uncover it together, drink, and sleep. The next night, Stark suggests to Berild that she must be a witch to have discovered the well. Berild explains that she knew the secret of the well's location from her father, who had crossed the desert in this place years ago. Stark accepts her explanation, but is privately unconvinced. They stay in the ruins two days, and then leave.
Chapter 9 - Stark and Berild arrive at Sinharat at dawn and find Kynon's caravan encamped outside. The Dryland armies have not yet arrived, but only Kynon and his mercenaries are in the city itself, which the drylanders regard as taboo. Stark and Berild enter Sinharat looking for Luhar, but Kynon prevents Stark and Luhar from fighting. Berild kills Luhar with a knife. Kynon does not punish Berild, but warns Stark not to fight with Freka, who has gone back to the desert, and condemns the infighting that threatens his plans. Berild lies to Kynon about how she and Stark reached Sinharat, pretending that they had more water than they did. Kynon dismisses Berild and Stark.
Chapter 10 - Stark awakes at dusk and finds Fianna there. She warns him that his life is in danger from Delgaun, when he arrives. Stark refuses to flee. Fianna leads Stark to a chamber where Berild is waiting. She warns him against Delgaun, and expresses her resentment at Kynon. Drums beat announcing the late arrival of Delgaun and his allies to Sinharat, and Stark and Berild part. As Stark leaves, he meets Fianna, who hints that Berild may be a Rama.
Chapter 11 - Kynon unveils the banner of the Ramas before the massed armies of the Drylands and the Low-canals in front of Sinharat. Stark confronts Delgaun as a fellow-follower of Kynon, and forces Delgaun to accept him as comrade-in-arms. Later, in council, Delgaun backs down before Kynon, and they proceed to plot the conquest of the City-States. Kynon warns his confederates not to reveal that they do not really have the secret of the Ramas. Days pass. Freka returns from Shun with more fighters, but Kynon keeps him and Stark from fighting. Later, Stark goes into Sinharat and finds Berild reading an ancient wall-inscription in an unknown language. Stark follows her as she goes to a high window.
Chapter 12 - Stark accuses Berild of being a Rama. Berild dismisses his statement with smooth explanations, but Stark does not accept them. Stark deduces that Delgaun must also be a Rama. Berild leaves suddenly. Stark goes later, and is attacked by Freka who is under the influence of shanga. As they are fighting, Kynon and his fighters discover them. Stark is accused of murdering Freka, and the Shunni demand his blood. Stark is knocked out as he tries to blurt out the truth of Kynon's charade. He awakes in an underground cell, guarded by a Shunni warrior. (This portion of the expansion is a rewrite of the middle of Chapter 9 of Catacombs.)
Chapter 13 - Fianna appears, shoots the Shunni, and frees Stark. Fianna reveals that she, Berild, and Delgaun are all surviving Ramas, though she is dependent upon them for the Sending-on of Minds. She leads him into the catacombs, where Stark disposes of the guard's body in a pit and takes his sword. Fianna describes Delgaun and Berild's plans for empire, and explains that they intend to dispose of Kynon by putting Delgaun's mind into Kynon's body. She asks Stark to help her prevent it, and leads him to Berild's chamber. There they find Kynon in bonds, and Berild preparing the real crowns of the Ramas for the Sending-on of Minds.
Chapter 14 - Stark enters, attacks Delgaun and kills him with the sword. Berild drops the crowns and draws a knife. Fianna frees Kynon, who throttles Berild as she slashes him. Stark tells the wounded Kynon to stop the march of the Drylanders. He and Fianna help Kynon out to the open stairway that leads up to Sinharat. From there, Kynon addresses the tribes, telling them of Delgaun and Berild's treachery and his own lie about having the secret of the Ramas. Then he collapses and dies. The mercenaries and the armies break up and leave. Stark returns to Sinharat and finds Fianna. She explains that she has hidden the crowns of the Ramas, unable to destroy them. She invites Stark to return to Sinharat late in his life, offering to make him a Rama then. He refuses. Fianna says that she will stay in Sinharat. Stark departs for Tarak to meet Simon Ashton, looking back at Sinharat as he goes.
[edit]
Expansion Commentary
The Sinharat expansion is very competently and intelligently written and very much in the mature Brackett style. The characters of Kynon and Fianna are given additional depth. Whereas in Catacombs Kynon was merely a villain and a tool of Delgaun and Berild, in Sinharat he is more intelligent and even tragic. Fianna's breaking of the crowns of the Ramas in Catacombs is a somewhat trite development; her awareness of her own weakness, and her thought for the future in Sinharat is both more tragic and more realistic, and this turn of events gives Stark's last look back at Sinharat an additional meaning that it had not had in Catacombs. The plot structure is enhanced by the delay in Stark's discovery that Berild is a Rama, and the awkward though necessary appearance of Delgaun is better handled in Sinharat. The inconsistency in Catacombs, whereby Fianna is a Rama unknown to anyone but herself, but (being in a very young body) must have undergone the Sending on of Minds very recently, is eliminated in Sinharat. Additional details about the layout of Sinharat are consistent with Brackett's late story The Road to Sinharat (1963).
[edit]
Characters
Eric John Stark, an outlaw mercenary warrior, born on Mercury, acting as a double agent.
Simon Ashton, an official of Earth Police Control, searching for Stark.
Delgaun of Valkis, lord of the wickedest of the Low-canal cities, hiring mercenaries to serve in a war in the Drylands.
Luhar, cashiered officer of the Venusian Guards, with a deadly grudge against Stark
Kynon of Shun, a Martian dryland barbarian with dreams of uniting the desert tribes and establishing an empire over the City-States of Mars.
Freka, a captain loyal to Kynon, but addicted to the terrible vice of shanga.
Berild, a red-haired Shunni woman, consort of Kynon, but actually using him to further her plans and Delgaun's.
Fianna, Berild's servant girl, possessed of wisdom and cunning far beyond her years.
The Ramas, an ancient and evil Martian nation, who had discovered the secret of immortality - at a terrible price, to be paid by others.
[edit]
Publication history
This story was first published under the title Queen of the Martian Catacombs in the pulp magazine Planet Stories, Summer 1949.
In 1964, after considerable revision and expansion, it was republished as The Secret of Sinharat as one part of an Ace Double novel; its companion was another expanded Eric John Stark story, People of the Talisman. The expansion has sometimes been attributed to Brackett's husband, Edmond Hamilton[1]. For The Secret of Sinharat, there is little internal evidence to support this suggestion.
In 1982, it appeared, again together with People of the Talisman, under the title Eric John Stark, Outlaw of Mars.
In 2005 the original Planet Stories version was republished in Sea-Kings of Mars and Otherworldly Stories, Volume 46 in the Gollancz Fantasy Masterworks series. It appeared the same year in the collection Stark and the Star Kings (Haffner Press).
In 2008, the entire Eric John Stark saga was republished, in E-Book form, by Baen Publishing, and is available thru Webscriptions.net.
[edit]
Titles
Queen of the Martian Catacombs is typical of the rather wordy and often misleading titles assigned to stories in Planet Stories, to go along with their colorful, action-packed, but equally misleading cover art. The cover of the Summer 1949 issue of Planet Stories gives the title as Queen of the Martian Catacombs: A Desert-worlds Novel by Leigh Brackett, with the explanatory blurb Across the red sands fought the Terran changeling to reach Berild, beautiful and fey - and blast her into eternal dust.... This is not a very accurate synopsis of the story.
The "catacombs" in question are the tunnels under Sinharat, although they do not play a very important part in either version of the story, and the "Queen" is apparently Berild, though her role is not really central enough to name the story after her. Planet, however, liked cover illustrations of beautiful women, and the Allen Anderson cover of the Summer 1949 issue indeed shows a red-haired woman in blue dress and high heels (!) astride a Martian steed resembling a frightened cartoon seahorse. An inappropriately pale-skinned Stark is shown in the foreground attempting to split the skull of a crouching, red-skinned Martian (?) with his sword—both sword and red Martian existing only in the illustrator's imagination. An architecturally banal Martian city languishes in the background, while the vivid yellow sky boasts over a dozen moons.
The later title, The Secret of Sinharat, is less irrelevant; the "secret" is presumably the Rama's secret method of mind-transference, and although it hardly belongs exclusively to the city of Sinharat, that city's prominent place as the setting for the story's climax is sufficiently important to make its use in the title not inappropriate.
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Footnotes
[edit]
References
Tuck, Donald H. (1974). The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Chicago: Advent. p. 28. ISBN 0-911682-20-1.
[edit]
External links
The Secret of Sinharat publication history at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
Categories: 1964 novels | Novels by Leigh Brackett | Mars in fiction
5 out of 5
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_of_Sinharat
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia The Secret of Sinharat
Cover of first edition.
Author Leigh Brackett
Country United States
Language English
Genre(s) Science fiction novel
Publisher Ace Books
Publication date 1964
Media type Print (Paperback)
Pages 95 pp
ISBN NA
Followed by People of the Talisman
The Secret of Sinharat is a science fiction novel by Leigh Brackett set on the planet Mars, whose protagonist is Eric John Stark.Contents [hide]
1 Plot summary
1.1 Queen of the Martian Catacombs
1.2 The Secret of Sinharat
1.3 Expansion Commentary
2 Characters
3 Publication history
4 Titles
5 Footnotes
6 References
7 External links
[edit]
Plot summary
For the first seven chapters, Queen of the Martian Catacombs and The Secret of Sinharat are almost word-for-word identical; the differences are inconsequential to the plot. In Chapter 1, a brief paragraph is inserted to situate the reader in the Leigh Brackett Solar System and to excuse the presence of non-Terran humans on planets like Mars through the concept of a prehistoric "seeding" - not mentioned elsewhere in Brackett's novels. In Chapter 5, an explicit reference to the events of Brackett's story The Beast-Jewel of Mars (Planet Stories, Winter 1948) has been cut, perhaps on the assumption that readers of the novel would not know or be interested in the earlier story. The Arabic word khamsin is consistently replaced by "storm wind", perhaps on the grounds that readers might not be familiar with the word (or mistake it for a Martian technical term).
Chapter 1 - Eric John Stark, fleeing from Venus where he has been running guns to native opponents of a Terro-Venusian mining concern (mining and mineral extraction companies recur as villains in Brackett's stories), has come to Mars to fight as a mercenary in a private war in the Martian Drylands on behalf of Delgaun, lord of the Martian city of Valkis. He is finally pinned down by agents of Earth Police Control. Their leader, Simon Ashton, offers him a deal: lifting of his sentence, if he agrees to act as a spy on Delgaun, whom Ashton claims is plotting a major war together with a barbarian leader called Kynon, of the Dryland tribe of Shun; a war that Ashton says will be disastrous for the drylanders. Stark agrees to go to Valkis as Ashton's agent, and return to report to him in the Martian city of Tarak.
Chapter 2 - Stark enters Valkis late at night and sees the drylanders gathering there. He meets Delgaun and several other mercenaries that Delgaun has hired. One of them is Luhar, an old enemy of Stark from Venus. They challenge each other, but Delgaun separates them. At dawn, Kynon of Shun enters Valkis.
Chapter 3 - Delgaun, Stark and the mercenaries go to see Kynon. In the public square of Valkis, Kynon demonstrates a technology which he claims to have recovered from the lost secrets of the Ramas, an ancient race of Martians who had acquired a form of immortality. Kynon, using two crystal circlets and a glowing rod, appears to transfer the consciousness of an old Martian man into a young Terran boy. The old man collapses and dies. Kynon returns with Delgaun and the others to the council room in the palace.
Chapter 4 - Stark accuses Kynon of an elaborate charade in which the boy was coached in his part and the old man was killed by poison. Kynon admits it, but justifies it as a necessity for uniting the drylanders against the City-States of the Dryland Borders, who are depriving them of water resources. Together with the men of Valkis and the other Low-canal cities, they will conquer the City-States and become fully independent of Terra. Stark goes to his quarters and sleeps through the day. At dusk he goes to the council-room, and finds Delgaun there with Kynon's female companion, Berild. Delgaun asks Stark to bring back one of Kynon's trusted captains, Freka, who is indulging in "a certain vice"; he needs to be back before Kynon sets out at midnight for his desert headquarters. On his way, Stark is stopped by Fianna, Berild's serving girl, who warns him that he is going into a trap set by Delgaun. Stark accepts the warning, but continues anyway.
Chapter 5 - Stark comes to Kala's, a broken-down dive in a mostly uninhabited part of Valkis. He finds Freka there, indulging in shanga, a radiation-induced temporary atavistic regression to a bestial state. Stark realizes that an empty room near Freka probably contains the trap set for him. When he is refused entrance to the room, he leaves Kala's and waits outside. He is followed by Luhar, who had been waiting in the empty room for a chance to attack Stark. Stark jumps Luhar; the fighting goes back into Kala's, where the shanga addicts and Kala herself become involved. Stark knocks Freka out, is stabbed by Luhar, knocks Luhar out, and returns with Freka to Delgaun's palace. Delgaun is surprised and angry; Berild is pleased.
Chapter 6 - At midnight, Kynon leaves Valkis with the drylanders and mercenaries. Kynon orders Stark and Luhar to remain apart from each other. Delgaun remains behind. Luhar and Freka confer. The caravan proceeds across the desert for three days, and on the fourth day they are hit by a sandstorm.
Chapter 7 - Luhar and Freka take advantage of the storm to jump Stark and leave him for dead. He finds himself together with Berild. When the storm blows out, they are lost in the desert. They proceed on foot. After four days, running out of water, they come to a wilderness of rocks.
From chapter 8 on the two versions diverge.
[edit]
Queen of the Martian Catacombs
Chapter 8 - Stark and Berild are dying of thirst. Berild leads Stark three miles out of their way to a ruined monastery. She miraculously discovers a long-buried well. After they have drunk and slept, Stark suggests to Berild that she is actually a surviving immortal Rama, and knew the location of the well from memory. Berild dismisses the accusation. They stay in the ruins two days, and then leave.
Chapter 9 - Stark and Berild arrive at Sinharat, the old city of the Ramas, where Kynon has made his headquarters. They find Kynon's army and his mercenaries camped in the desert outside the city. Stark enters Sinharat looking for Luhar, and fatally attacks him when he finds him. Delgaun is also mysteriously there. Kynon arrests Stark and places him in a subterranean cell in Sinharat under Freka's guard. Before Freka can kill Stark, Fianna appears and shoots him. Stark disposes of Freka in a pit in the catacombs. Fianna explains that Delgaun and Berild are both Ramas, and that while Kynon wants empire, Delgaun and Berild want to control Mars - without Kynon - through their mercenary outlander clients.
Chapter 10 - Stark and Fianna proceed to a crypt below Sinharat where Berild is waiting. Kynon is there with her, but drugged and under Berild's hypnotic control. Berild offers to become Stark's lover and to make him a Rama, by exchanging his mind with Kynon's, and disposing of Delgaun after the war. Stark agrees, and Berild produces the real crowns of the Ramas, and puts them on Stark's and Kynon's heads.
Chapter 11 - Stark awakes to find himself in Kynon's body. His own body is still there, alive but with Kynon's mind still under hypnosis. Berild locks Kynon, in Stark's body, in a small cell. Stark-as-Kynon goes with Berild to address the armies assembled at Sinharat from a high ledge in the city. Delgaun is there. Instead of leading them to war, Stark reveals the charade of the false Rama crowns. Berild stabs Stark in the back. Stark reveals Berild's treachery to Delgaun. Delgaun throws Berild from the ledge and attempts to unseat Stark from his steed and flee. Stark, though wounded, grasps Delgaun and throttles him, while Delgaun stabs him repeatedly. Stark kills Delgaun and loses consciousness. Fianna runs to him.
Chapter 12 - Stark awakes and finds himself with Fianna. He is back in the crypt below Sinharat, in his own body. Kynon is next to him, dead. Fianna reveals that she is also a Rama, unknown to Berild and Delgaun. She expresses remorse for her past evil and destroys the rod and crowns of the Ramas. Stark and Fianna leave together and find Sinharat deserted. Fianna decides to stay in Sinharat for a while before she decides what to do. Stark departs for Tarak to meet Simon Ashton.
[edit]
The Secret of Sinharat
Chapter 8 - Stark and Berild are dying of thirst. Berild leads Stark three miles out of their way to an old ruin, where they both collapse. At night, Stark wakes to see Berild tracing her steps to the site of a long-buried well. They uncover it together, drink, and sleep. The next night, Stark suggests to Berild that she must be a witch to have discovered the well. Berild explains that she knew the secret of the well's location from her father, who had crossed the desert in this place years ago. Stark accepts her explanation, but is privately unconvinced. They stay in the ruins two days, and then leave.
Chapter 9 - Stark and Berild arrive at Sinharat at dawn and find Kynon's caravan encamped outside. The Dryland armies have not yet arrived, but only Kynon and his mercenaries are in the city itself, which the drylanders regard as taboo. Stark and Berild enter Sinharat looking for Luhar, but Kynon prevents Stark and Luhar from fighting. Berild kills Luhar with a knife. Kynon does not punish Berild, but warns Stark not to fight with Freka, who has gone back to the desert, and condemns the infighting that threatens his plans. Berild lies to Kynon about how she and Stark reached Sinharat, pretending that they had more water than they did. Kynon dismisses Berild and Stark.
Chapter 10 - Stark awakes at dusk and finds Fianna there. She warns him that his life is in danger from Delgaun, when he arrives. Stark refuses to flee. Fianna leads Stark to a chamber where Berild is waiting. She warns him against Delgaun, and expresses her resentment at Kynon. Drums beat announcing the late arrival of Delgaun and his allies to Sinharat, and Stark and Berild part. As Stark leaves, he meets Fianna, who hints that Berild may be a Rama.
Chapter 11 - Kynon unveils the banner of the Ramas before the massed armies of the Drylands and the Low-canals in front of Sinharat. Stark confronts Delgaun as a fellow-follower of Kynon, and forces Delgaun to accept him as comrade-in-arms. Later, in council, Delgaun backs down before Kynon, and they proceed to plot the conquest of the City-States. Kynon warns his confederates not to reveal that they do not really have the secret of the Ramas. Days pass. Freka returns from Shun with more fighters, but Kynon keeps him and Stark from fighting. Later, Stark goes into Sinharat and finds Berild reading an ancient wall-inscription in an unknown language. Stark follows her as she goes to a high window.
Chapter 12 - Stark accuses Berild of being a Rama. Berild dismisses his statement with smooth explanations, but Stark does not accept them. Stark deduces that Delgaun must also be a Rama. Berild leaves suddenly. Stark goes later, and is attacked by Freka who is under the influence of shanga. As they are fighting, Kynon and his fighters discover them. Stark is accused of murdering Freka, and the Shunni demand his blood. Stark is knocked out as he tries to blurt out the truth of Kynon's charade. He awakes in an underground cell, guarded by a Shunni warrior. (This portion of the expansion is a rewrite of the middle of Chapter 9 of Catacombs.)
Chapter 13 - Fianna appears, shoots the Shunni, and frees Stark. Fianna reveals that she, Berild, and Delgaun are all surviving Ramas, though she is dependent upon them for the Sending-on of Minds. She leads him into the catacombs, where Stark disposes of the guard's body in a pit and takes his sword. Fianna describes Delgaun and Berild's plans for empire, and explains that they intend to dispose of Kynon by putting Delgaun's mind into Kynon's body. She asks Stark to help her prevent it, and leads him to Berild's chamber. There they find Kynon in bonds, and Berild preparing the real crowns of the Ramas for the Sending-on of Minds.
Chapter 14 - Stark enters, attacks Delgaun and kills him with the sword. Berild drops the crowns and draws a knife. Fianna frees Kynon, who throttles Berild as she slashes him. Stark tells the wounded Kynon to stop the march of the Drylanders. He and Fianna help Kynon out to the open stairway that leads up to Sinharat. From there, Kynon addresses the tribes, telling them of Delgaun and Berild's treachery and his own lie about having the secret of the Ramas. Then he collapses and dies. The mercenaries and the armies break up and leave. Stark returns to Sinharat and finds Fianna. She explains that she has hidden the crowns of the Ramas, unable to destroy them. She invites Stark to return to Sinharat late in his life, offering to make him a Rama then. He refuses. Fianna says that she will stay in Sinharat. Stark departs for Tarak to meet Simon Ashton, looking back at Sinharat as he goes.
[edit]
Expansion Commentary
The Sinharat expansion is very competently and intelligently written and very much in the mature Brackett style. The characters of Kynon and Fianna are given additional depth. Whereas in Catacombs Kynon was merely a villain and a tool of Delgaun and Berild, in Sinharat he is more intelligent and even tragic. Fianna's breaking of the crowns of the Ramas in Catacombs is a somewhat trite development; her awareness of her own weakness, and her thought for the future in Sinharat is both more tragic and more realistic, and this turn of events gives Stark's last look back at Sinharat an additional meaning that it had not had in Catacombs. The plot structure is enhanced by the delay in Stark's discovery that Berild is a Rama, and the awkward though necessary appearance of Delgaun is better handled in Sinharat. The inconsistency in Catacombs, whereby Fianna is a Rama unknown to anyone but herself, but (being in a very young body) must have undergone the Sending on of Minds very recently, is eliminated in Sinharat. Additional details about the layout of Sinharat are consistent with Brackett's late story The Road to Sinharat (1963).
[edit]
Characters
Eric John Stark, an outlaw mercenary warrior, born on Mercury, acting as a double agent.
Simon Ashton, an official of Earth Police Control, searching for Stark.
Delgaun of Valkis, lord of the wickedest of the Low-canal cities, hiring mercenaries to serve in a war in the Drylands.
Luhar, cashiered officer of the Venusian Guards, with a deadly grudge against Stark
Kynon of Shun, a Martian dryland barbarian with dreams of uniting the desert tribes and establishing an empire over the City-States of Mars.
Freka, a captain loyal to Kynon, but addicted to the terrible vice of shanga.
Berild, a red-haired Shunni woman, consort of Kynon, but actually using him to further her plans and Delgaun's.
Fianna, Berild's servant girl, possessed of wisdom and cunning far beyond her years.
The Ramas, an ancient and evil Martian nation, who had discovered the secret of immortality - at a terrible price, to be paid by others.
[edit]
Publication history
This story was first published under the title Queen of the Martian Catacombs in the pulp magazine Planet Stories, Summer 1949.
In 1964, after considerable revision and expansion, it was republished as The Secret of Sinharat as one part of an Ace Double novel; its companion was another expanded Eric John Stark story, People of the Talisman. The expansion has sometimes been attributed to Brackett's husband, Edmond Hamilton[1]. For The Secret of Sinharat, there is little internal evidence to support this suggestion.
In 1982, it appeared, again together with People of the Talisman, under the title Eric John Stark, Outlaw of Mars.
In 2005 the original Planet Stories version was republished in Sea-Kings of Mars and Otherworldly Stories, Volume 46 in the Gollancz Fantasy Masterworks series. It appeared the same year in the collection Stark and the Star Kings (Haffner Press).
In 2008, the entire Eric John Stark saga was republished, in E-Book form, by Baen Publishing, and is available thru Webscriptions.net.
[edit]
Titles
Queen of the Martian Catacombs is typical of the rather wordy and often misleading titles assigned to stories in Planet Stories, to go along with their colorful, action-packed, but equally misleading cover art. The cover of the Summer 1949 issue of Planet Stories gives the title as Queen of the Martian Catacombs: A Desert-worlds Novel by Leigh Brackett, with the explanatory blurb Across the red sands fought the Terran changeling to reach Berild, beautiful and fey - and blast her into eternal dust.... This is not a very accurate synopsis of the story.
The "catacombs" in question are the tunnels under Sinharat, although they do not play a very important part in either version of the story, and the "Queen" is apparently Berild, though her role is not really central enough to name the story after her. Planet, however, liked cover illustrations of beautiful women, and the Allen Anderson cover of the Summer 1949 issue indeed shows a red-haired woman in blue dress and high heels (!) astride a Martian steed resembling a frightened cartoon seahorse. An inappropriately pale-skinned Stark is shown in the foreground attempting to split the skull of a crouching, red-skinned Martian (?) with his sword—both sword and red Martian existing only in the illustrator's imagination. An architecturally banal Martian city languishes in the background, while the vivid yellow sky boasts over a dozen moons.
The later title, The Secret of Sinharat, is less irrelevant; the "secret" is presumably the Rama's secret method of mind-transference, and although it hardly belongs exclusively to the city of Sinharat, that city's prominent place as the setting for the story's climax is sufficiently important to make its use in the title not inappropriate.
[edit]
Footnotes
[edit]
References
Tuck, Donald H. (1974). The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Chicago: Advent. p. 28. ISBN 0-911682-20-1.
[edit]
External links
The Secret of Sinharat publication history at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
Categories: 1964 novels | Novels by Leigh Brackett | Mars in fiction
5 out of 5
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_of_Sinharat
Queen Of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Novella
Number of words : 22000
Percent of complex words : 5.2
Average syllables per word : 1.4
Average words per sentence : 12.0
READABILITY INDICES
Fog : 6.8525
Flesch : 79.2826
Flesch-Kincaid : 5.1779
PEOPLE
Eric John Stark
N'Chaka, oh Man-without-a-tribe who is on the run. Gets to be an agent.
Simon Ashton
Stark's friend and mentor who has a deal for him he can't say no to.
Kynon
A barbarian chieftain from Shun. The Giver of Life.
Delgaun
A bandit, and one of the System's top criminals.
Knighton
Terran bandit. Owner of a fast cruiser.
Walsh
Terran bandit. A genius weaponeer.
Themis
Mercurian bandit. Also a mechanic.
Arrod
Callistan bandit and organised crime leader.
Luthar
Venusian bandit. A cashiered officer of the Venusian Guards. Has worked with and betrayed Stark before.
Berild
Raman woman, allied with Kynon.
Tika
Girl Stark knew, killed by a giant bird.
Freka
Kynon's captain and indulger in Shanga.
Fianna
Rama woman who is sick of the lifestyle and hates Kynon.
Kala
Old woman, owner of Kala's.
PLACES
Valkis
Martian Low Canal town.
Barrakesh
Martian Low Canal town.
Tarak
Where the Earth Commission offices are located.
Kesh
Martian drylands area.
Shun
Martian drylands area.
Kala's
Bar in Jekkara.
Belly of Stones
Ancient Raman underground, where Stark and Berild shelter.
Twilight Belt
Habitable zone on Mercury.
Sinharat
Rallying point for the tribes and Kynon's plans for war. Has Catacombs.
TECHNOLOGY
Venusian spider silk
Used for making clothes.
Crowns of the Ramas
Used for mind transfer. Or so it is said.
Purcell electronic discharge
Useful for fake shows.
Shanga
The going-back drug. Makes people more primitive.
WEAPONS
Banning
An electrical gun.
ORGANISATIONS
Earth Police Control
Hunters of Stark.
Terro-Venusian Metals
A company Stark opposed.
The Martian Council of City-States
Martian government organisation.
Earth Commission
Earth government organisation related to Mars.
Venusian Guards
Venus military group.
Brotherhood of the Little Worlds
Organised crime on the smaller planetary bodies.
Space Patrol
Police organisaiton, whom the Brotherhood drove nuts.
RACES
Middle Venusians
Martian swamp dwellers.
Ramas
Ancient Martian serial immortals. The Twice Born.
Keshi
Martian barbarians.
CONCEPT
Khamsin
Martian storm.
PLOT
Simon Ashton and his posse catch up to Eric John Stark, his former mentee and almost-son.
Stark has a long stretch in the slammer hanging over his head, so Ashton offers him a deal. Be his agent in trying to break up the plans Kynon and Delgaun have for provoking an inter-regional war, and the slate is wiped clean.
Stark does so and discovers at the heart of it, along with several crimelords are the remnants of the Rama race - people that can transfer their consciousness to different bodies.
Stark has an enemy in Luhar, who sold him out when he was doing some gunrunning for some locals. Therefore, they try and set him up at Kala's when he is tasked with retrieving one of Kynon's captains, Freka, from his overindulgence in Shanga. Or, Wild Man vs Beastial Men.
The Rama woman Berild also takes an interest in Stark, growing tired of Kynon, and has her own body switching plans.
This pair has reckoned without Berild's Rama servant Fianna - who has her own plans and hates Kynon. Hence she aids Stark. It doesn't hurt that Stark is nice to her, either. Warning him of ambush, helping him out of prison, and helping to engineer the downfall of her fellows.
4.5 out of 5
http://www.archive.org/details/QueenOfTheMartianCatacombs
Number of words : 22000
Percent of complex words : 5.2
Average syllables per word : 1.4
Average words per sentence : 12.0
READABILITY INDICES
Fog : 6.8525
Flesch : 79.2826
Flesch-Kincaid : 5.1779
PEOPLE
Eric John Stark
N'Chaka, oh Man-without-a-tribe who is on the run. Gets to be an agent.
Simon Ashton
Stark's friend and mentor who has a deal for him he can't say no to.
Kynon
A barbarian chieftain from Shun. The Giver of Life.
Delgaun
A bandit, and one of the System's top criminals.
Knighton
Terran bandit. Owner of a fast cruiser.
Walsh
Terran bandit. A genius weaponeer.
Themis
Mercurian bandit. Also a mechanic.
Arrod
Callistan bandit and organised crime leader.
Luthar
Venusian bandit. A cashiered officer of the Venusian Guards. Has worked with and betrayed Stark before.
Berild
Raman woman, allied with Kynon.
Tika
Girl Stark knew, killed by a giant bird.
Freka
Kynon's captain and indulger in Shanga.
Fianna
Rama woman who is sick of the lifestyle and hates Kynon.
Kala
Old woman, owner of Kala's.
PLACES
Valkis
Martian Low Canal town.
Barrakesh
Martian Low Canal town.
Tarak
Where the Earth Commission offices are located.
Kesh
Martian drylands area.
Shun
Martian drylands area.
Kala's
Bar in Jekkara.
Belly of Stones
Ancient Raman underground, where Stark and Berild shelter.
Twilight Belt
Habitable zone on Mercury.
Sinharat
Rallying point for the tribes and Kynon's plans for war. Has Catacombs.
TECHNOLOGY
Venusian spider silk
Used for making clothes.
Crowns of the Ramas
Used for mind transfer. Or so it is said.
Purcell electronic discharge
Useful for fake shows.
Shanga
The going-back drug. Makes people more primitive.
WEAPONS
Banning
An electrical gun.
ORGANISATIONS
Earth Police Control
Hunters of Stark.
Terro-Venusian Metals
A company Stark opposed.
The Martian Council of City-States
Martian government organisation.
Earth Commission
Earth government organisation related to Mars.
Venusian Guards
Venus military group.
Brotherhood of the Little Worlds
Organised crime on the smaller planetary bodies.
Space Patrol
Police organisaiton, whom the Brotherhood drove nuts.
RACES
Middle Venusians
Martian swamp dwellers.
Ramas
Ancient Martian serial immortals. The Twice Born.
Keshi
Martian barbarians.
CONCEPT
Khamsin
Martian storm.
PLOT
Simon Ashton and his posse catch up to Eric John Stark, his former mentee and almost-son.
Stark has a long stretch in the slammer hanging over his head, so Ashton offers him a deal. Be his agent in trying to break up the plans Kynon and Delgaun have for provoking an inter-regional war, and the slate is wiped clean.
Stark does so and discovers at the heart of it, along with several crimelords are the remnants of the Rama race - people that can transfer their consciousness to different bodies.
Stark has an enemy in Luhar, who sold him out when he was doing some gunrunning for some locals. Therefore, they try and set him up at Kala's when he is tasked with retrieving one of Kynon's captains, Freka, from his overindulgence in Shanga. Or, Wild Man vs Beastial Men.
The Rama woman Berild also takes an interest in Stark, growing tired of Kynon, and has her own body switching plans.
This pair has reckoned without Berild's Rama servant Fianna - who has her own plans and hates Kynon. Hence she aids Stark. It doesn't hurt that Stark is nice to her, either. Warning him of ambush, helping him out of prison, and helping to engineer the downfall of her fellows.
4.5 out of 5
http://www.archive.org/details/QueenOfTheMartianCatacombs
Ramas : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Ancient Martian serial immortals. The Twice Born.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Middle Venusians : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Martian swamp dwellers.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Space Patrol : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Police organisation, whom the Brotherhood drove nuts.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Brotherhood of the Little Worlds : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Organised crime on the smaller planetary bodies.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Earth Commission : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Earth government organisation related to Mars.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
The Martian Council of City-States : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Martian government organisation.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Terro-Venusian Metals : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
A company Stark opposed.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Shanga : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
The going-back drug. Makes people more primitive.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Purcell electronic discharge : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Useful for fake shows.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Crowns of the Ramas : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Used for mind transfer. Or so it is said.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Venusian spider silk : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Used for making clothes.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Sinharat : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Rallying point for the tribes and Kynon's plans for war. Has Catacombs.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Twilight Belt : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Habitable zone on Mercury.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Belly of Stones : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Ancient Raman underground, where Stark and Berild shelter.
4 out of 5
4 out of 5
Tarak : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Where the Earth Commission offices are located.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Fianna : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Rama woman who is sick of the lifestyle and hates Kynon.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Freka : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Kynon's captain and indulger in Shanga.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Tika : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Girl Stark knew, killed by a giant bird.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Berild : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Raman woman, allied with Kynon.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Luthar : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Venusian bandit. A cashiered officer of the Venusian Guards. Has worked with and betrayed Stark before.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Arrod : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Callistan bandit and organised crime leader.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Themis : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Mercurian bandit. Also a mechanic.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Walsh : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Terran bandit. A genius weaponeer.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Knighton : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Terran bandit. Owner of a fast cruiser.
3 out of 5
3 out of 5
Delgaun : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
A bandit, and one of the System's top criminals.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Kynon : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
A barbarian chieftain from Shun. The Giver of Life.
3.5 out of 5
3.5 out of 5
Simon Ashton : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
Stark's friend and mentor who has a deal for him he can't say no to.
4.5 out of 5
4.5 out of 5
Eric John Stark : Queen of the Martian Catacombs - Leigh Brackett
N'Chaka, oh Man-without-a-tribe who is on the run. Gets to be an agent.
5 out of 5
5 out of 5
Myth-Adventures in Leigh Brackett's Enchantress of Venus - Terry Hansen
Apparently in Extrapolation 23, Spring 1982, pp77-82. Seriously doubt I am ever likely to find this, so if anyone who has read it has anything to say?
Unseen.
http://books.google.com/books?id=3JXnz9x9sO4C&pg=PA861&lpg=PA861&dq=enchantress+of+venus&source=bl&ots=trKo-1XK6R&sig=6vhABzPl80zHOAyDPyNzRfvi54g&hl=en&ei=ocPeSdD3DY3gtAOXrpy6CQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=14#v=onepage&q=enchantress%20of%20venus&f=false
Unseen.
http://books.google.com/books?id=3JXnz9x9sO4C&pg=PA861&lpg=PA861&dq=enchantress+of+venus&source=bl&ots=trKo-1XK6R&sig=6vhABzPl80zHOAyDPyNzRfvi54g&hl=en&ei=ocPeSdD3DY3gtAOXrpy6CQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=14#v=onepage&q=enchantress%20of%20venus&f=false
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