My initial reaction on picking up this book was that I had never heard of Keith Laumer, but the first story in the book, In The Queue, was a story I had read years ago and never forgotten. It's the one about the bloke waiting most of his life in line (in shifts with other family members) to present his papers to the government.
The Lighter Side is a collection of short stories and one short novel, Time Trap. I purchased it on eBay as part of mixed set, and have been reading it over the last few weeks with amusement. Laumer has the ability to take a well worn idea from science fiction, present it amusingly, and then provide a different ending. You'd think that no-one could find anything more to say about 'friendly alien being comes to earth and gets shot by local xenophobe'. But Laumer's town council in The Exterminator, distressed at the bad publicity the xenophobe has provoked, manage to find a new solution to this perennial problem in fiction.
I also enjoyed The Planet Wreckers, which I had heard of but never read. I thought it must be a poke at all disaster films of the last decade or so, but it was first published in 1967. And The Body Builders, also amusing, was written in the 1960's not the 1990's; Laumer must have been psychic.
I could mention a few more stories, but will just say I kept finding I was smiling when I finished most of the stories in this book. An enjoyable read.
And for those of us not from the USA who read this book, a rutabaga is also known as a swede, a swedish turnip, a yellow turnip, or a neep.
The Lighter Side collection first published 2001, contents first published 1964 to 1970
The Lighter Side is a collection of short stories and one short novel, Time Trap. I purchased it on eBay as part of mixed set, and have been reading it over the last few weeks with amusement. Laumer has the ability to take a well worn idea from science fiction, present it amusingly, and then provide a different ending. You'd think that no-one could find anything more to say about 'friendly alien being comes to earth and gets shot by local xenophobe'. But Laumer's town council in The Exterminator, distressed at the bad publicity the xenophobe has provoked, manage to find a new solution to this perennial problem in fiction.
I also enjoyed The Planet Wreckers, which I had heard of but never read. I thought it must be a poke at all disaster films of the last decade or so, but it was first published in 1967. And The Body Builders, also amusing, was written in the 1960's not the 1990's; Laumer must have been psychic.
I could mention a few more stories, but will just say I kept finding I was smiling when I finished most of the stories in this book. An enjoyable read.
And for those of us not from the USA who read this book, a rutabaga is also known as a swede, a swedish turnip, a yellow turnip, or a neep.
The Lighter Side collection first published 2001, contents first published 1964 to 1970
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