Manly Wade Wellman's book ended up being closer to my expectations for a Golden Age SF novel than Aldiss's. In it, a daring young man undertakes a scouting expedition into alien territory fifty years after they devastated the world and took over control of large portions of it. To defeat the "Cold Creatures" (whose invasion of such an environmentally inhospitable planet must have inspired M. Night Shyamalan's Signs), Wellman's protagonist has to demonstrate such an implausible amount of good fortune that the author keeps remarking on it throughout the book. It's the sort of thing that makes me wonder if the book was a contractual obligation which Wellman just wasn't that interested in writing,

For this Ace Double I started with Brian Aldiss's Bow Down to Nul. It's the first Aldiss novel that I've ever read, but it's unlikely to be last. It's about an alien occupation of Earth that comes under investigation by the occupiers when a dismissed bureaucrat levels charges of corruption against the governor. Given that it was written in 1960 it reads as a surprisingly advanced critique of capitalism as well as imperialism, and it's refreshing to have an indecisive collaborator as the main human protagonist instead of the square-jawed action type so typical of the era. The ending is also a little different from its counterparts of the time, which wraps it all up with a nice sense of irony.

Now it's on to Manly Wade Wellman's book, which has a high bar to cross to equal its companion tale.

This book continues the story of the human race on fare distant Helliconia. It does not pick up immediately after the first book, but rather hundreds of years in to the future. Everything is still being observed by the people of the Avernus satellite and beamed back to Earth. In the story the summer of the Great Year (1829 normal years) is approaching. Many tropical areas have become almost unlivable. The Phagors (ancient enemies of mankind) are in a docile period preparing for the Winter. The story includes political intrigue, murder, divorce, etc.

All in all a good story with good characters. I will be reading the last book in the trilogy.

The central character in this book is the planet Helliconia. The story shows how the primitive civilizations and flora and fauna are influenced by planetary forces with seasons that last thousands of years. Readers must keep in mind that this book is the start of a trilogy or they will not like the ending.

All in all it is a good start and makes me want to read the next book in the trilogy.

It has been a while since I read his “Trillion Year Spree”, but I would respectfully submit that Aldiss may very well have made his case for the essential nature of science fiction in making and moving on the modern world.

It is difficult to think of another genre so relevant, and at the same time (in its various forms) so popular and influential. I think he did much to point out the debt we owe the revolutionary authors like Mary Shelley (Frankenstein), and the hot-housing role of science-fiction short stories in incubating new (or reheated) ideas.

Brian Aldiss championed SF to the world outside, and occasionally gave those of us who were a little bit . . . insular . . . the ticking-off we deserved. He was part of the community in a good way, attending sf conventions, always approachable, and being the life and soul of the party but always producing books and criticism which challenged us. You could never quite predict what the next Aldiss novel would be, but you always knew there would be something to think about. He was a remarkable man. Even though he received an OBE and an honorary doctorate for "services to literature", I suspect he would have been much more successful in "critical" terms if he had jettisoned science fiction, and he would have been more successful in the sf world if he had buckled down to churn out identikit trilogies. "His work is still [in a sense] to be discovered." Yes, that's correct. It was wide, various, and deep. But those of us who discovered even a part of it are grateful to have done so. 

Thank you, Brian.

If you're into SF, read on.