STARHAVEN is Silverberg’s only novel under the Jorgenson name, originally published by Thomas Bouregy in 1958 and reprinted a year later by Ace as the other half of Edmond Hamilton’s THE SUN SMASHER, which I wrote about a couple of weeks ago. It’s the story of Johnny Mantell, a beachcomber and bum on the resort planet Mulciber, who has to flee from his peaceful existence because he’s unjustly accused of murder. He steals a spaceship and heads for Starhaven, a giant metal-enclosed sanctuary world where criminals of all sorts, even murderers, can find, well, haven. Naturally enough, on a world populated by criminals there aren’t any laws, so Johnny may have his work cut out just surviving on Starhaven.
Once he gets there, however, he finds himself taken under the wing of the benevolent dictator who runs the place. Unfortunately, he also finds himself attracted to the dictator’s beautiful girlfriend, and then there’s this sinister conspiracy in which he gets involved . . .
This is a pretty simple plot and could probably work as a straight crime novel or a Western with a few changes. But then about halfway through, Silverberg pulls a nice SF-nal twist. It doesn’t come as a big shocker, but it’s still effective, and there’s another good twist later on. And of course, being Silverberg’s work, the prose is very smooth and readable.
I’m going by memory here, but it seems to me that “Ivar Jorgenson” started out as a personal pseudonym for Paul W. Fairman but eventually became a house-name used in the Ziff-Davis science fiction magazines edited by Fairman, as well as a few other places. STARHAVEN may well be an expansion of one of Silverberg’s yarns for the SF digests; I haven’t been able to find out about that. I believe it’s gone unreprinted since this Ace edition.
I’m one of those oddballs who likes Silverberg’s early novels as well or better than his later ones, but that’s because I prefer my science fiction more action-oriented. STARHAVEN is an entertaining yarn, and taken in tandem with THE SUN SMASHER, they make this one of the better Ace SF Doubles I’ve read.
11 comments:
And there were spelling variations on Ivar Jorgenson...Ivor and Jorgensen, as I recall...and I think you're correct that Paul Fairman was the original IJ, but boy did pseuds get swapped around at Ziff-Davis and then spill out into the rest of publishing (particularly when Ray Palmer or Fairman were in an editorial position...in the 1950s, Fairman was founding editor of IF (which started as a clone of the ZD magazines), went back to ZD to take over AMAZING and FANTASTIC from Howard Browne, and to found shortlived FANTASTIC spinoff DREAM WORLD, and went from their to Managing Editor of EQMM...don't know if he edited again after that, though he was certainly ghosting Lester Del Rey's juveniles in the early '60s from LDR's outlines.
Amd, James, never be afraid to ask Bob on FM.
I have signed one bit of published prose "Alexander Blade," just for the hell of it.
I'm with you on silverberg. I like his early stuff the best. More adventure focused. I love these old kinds of covers too. Maybe because as a kid that's how they always said rockets were going to look.
That is such a strange notion, taking the place of a writer who you admired. (or writers).
Starhaven began life as "Thunder Over Starhaven" in the October, 1957 issue of Science Fiction Adventures. (The same magazine published the Silverberg stories that would become Lest We Forget Thee, Earth, The Planet Killers, and Stepsons of Terra.)
As with many of the Ace titles, Starhaven was first published in hardcover by Avalon.
I believe Fairman, like his colleague and fellow Amazing/Fantastic editor Howard Browne, much preferred the mystery field to science fiction, and his work shows it. Nonetheless, one SF book by Fairman I have been looking for is The Golden Ape, written with Milton Lesser/Stephen Marlowe under the joint pseudonym "Adam Chase".
Love the cover! And THE SUN SMASHERS is pretty good, too. You're right, James, this is one of the better ACE DOUBLES.
Silverberg went on to write so many important and classic novels...but like you I still enjoy his pulp stories. I hope somebody keeps bringing out his pulp stuff in various volumes. Starhaven is a good one, a cut above most action sf. Yes he wrote ten thousand words a day but a lot of those words ere damned good.
So Lester Del Rey was not really Lester Del Rey? Were there others published under that name?
Well, at least four juveniles, and rather bad ones (to judge by the one I had, THE RUNAWAY ROBOT) were outlined by a blocked (iirc) del Rey and actually written by Fairman. I'm not sure he had any other fiction ghosted.
I read THE RUNAWAY ROBOT with my son late last year, and it is indeed slow and predictable. The other SBS LDR title I have is TUNNEL THROUGH TIME but haven't read it.
I, too, am a big fan of STARHAVEN, and have read it several times since it first came out. I have it in the original 1957 magazine version, got it from my school friend, Bob Ade, who had first removed the cover because he was afraid his mother would disapprove of the exotic bare-breasted girl depicted! I have sold SF myself, and art to Galaxy, If, Mirage Press and Arkham House.
Post a Comment