soph (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sophia_sol) wrote2019-08-07 06:08 pm
sophia_sol) wrote2019-08-07 06:08 pm
David Starr, Space Ranger, by Isaac Asimov
It's a Boys Own Adventure IN SPACE! It's.....not my usual kind of book. But it was kind of riveting? The characters are one-dimensional, the narrative is infodumpy, the plot is silly, but it was still a fun read. I'm probably gonna read the rest of the series. Or at least the next book.
(Thinking about it, it's kind of a parallel to Georgette Heyer's novels: equally shallow and variously problematic, but one very TRADITIONALLY MASCULINE and the other very TRADITIONALLY FEMININE for the era in which these authors were writing. They're two sides of the same coin.)
The plot of David Starr, Space Ranger goes as follows. David Starr was orphaned at a young age, then raised by two close family friends he knows as uncles. David grows up to be JUST LIKE HIS FATHER except SMARTER. David's sent off by his uncles (who have high political positions) on a mission to Mars to discover the cause of MYSTERIOUS POISONINGS occurring throughout the solar system!
David is MACHO and CLEVER and immediately manages to get himself an undercover position as a farmboy on a farm with questionable happenings, and gets himself ingratiated with the rest of the farmboys by acquitting himself well in a FIGHT.
Then he discovers SECRET UNDERGROUND TELEPATHIC ALIENS who provide him with a special force-field mask thing that can hide his identity while also protecting him from attack! He is now the SPACE RANGER and uses his powers, along with the info he sussed out while undercover, to EXPOSE THE PLOT and bring about the downfall of the villains! SUCCESS ALL ROUND. The end. Whew.
Yes, the only female character is David's dead mother. Yes, when David accidentally kills a man he doesn't seem to care about it at all. Yes, the aliens' role in the narrative uncomfortably parallels the "Magical Negro" trope. Yes, Our Hero uses the threat of torture to get the bad guy to confess the evil plans.
But the whole story tripped along in a very readable way, and I always wanted to know what was going to happen next, even if I didn't particularly care about it. It suited my needs of being entertaining when I didn't have the energy to pay attention to a more complicated or involving narrative. So there we are.
(Thinking about it, it's kind of a parallel to Georgette Heyer's novels: equally shallow and variously problematic, but one very TRADITIONALLY MASCULINE and the other very TRADITIONALLY FEMININE for the era in which these authors were writing. They're two sides of the same coin.)
The plot of David Starr, Space Ranger goes as follows. David Starr was orphaned at a young age, then raised by two close family friends he knows as uncles. David grows up to be JUST LIKE HIS FATHER except SMARTER. David's sent off by his uncles (who have high political positions) on a mission to Mars to discover the cause of MYSTERIOUS POISONINGS occurring throughout the solar system!
David is MACHO and CLEVER and immediately manages to get himself an undercover position as a farmboy on a farm with questionable happenings, and gets himself ingratiated with the rest of the farmboys by acquitting himself well in a FIGHT.
Then he discovers SECRET UNDERGROUND TELEPATHIC ALIENS who provide him with a special force-field mask thing that can hide his identity while also protecting him from attack! He is now the SPACE RANGER and uses his powers, along with the info he sussed out while undercover, to EXPOSE THE PLOT and bring about the downfall of the villains! SUCCESS ALL ROUND. The end. Whew.
Yes, the only female character is David's dead mother. Yes, when David accidentally kills a man he doesn't seem to care about it at all. Yes, the aliens' role in the narrative uncomfortably parallels the "Magical Negro" trope. Yes, Our Hero uses the threat of torture to get the bad guy to confess the evil plans.
But the whole story tripped along in a very readable way, and I always wanted to know what was going to happen next, even if I didn't particularly care about it. It suited my needs of being entertaining when I didn't have the energy to pay attention to a more complicated or involving narrative. So there we are.