The main character becomes addicted early in the story, and no magical cures are found, though he expresses the hope for one at the end. The rest is pretty humdrum, but Clement writes well enough to pull us along. The fun of the story is really the chemistry. Longer than Needle, this story hinges on the answer to the question: ‘How would someone from a furnace planet, say someone who breathes gaseous sulfur, react to Earth, which would seem extremely cold?’ The story then postulates a plant material from Earth which in gaseous form is addictive to natives of the furnace planet, and a drug runner who is trying to increase his supply of ‘tofacco’.Īll that’s a stretch, but much science fiction is based on the willing suspension of disbelief.
Iceworld – originally published Astounding Science Fiction (1953) I guessed the answer about halfway through the 201 page novelette, but didn’t see the clue for it until the end. One by one the suspects are eliminated, there is no violence, and clues are provided. In this case Hunter is inhabiting the body of Robert Kincaid, and they are working together to find Killer who must by deduction be in the body of one of the inhabitants of a small Pacific island on which Robert lives. Clement’s solution was to have the detective be an alien inhabiting a human body, hunting another alien who is doing the same. that a fair play mystery could never be written in the science fiction genre. The introduction says that one of the reasons Clement wrote this was in response to a remark by John W. I didn’t expect it to read like a juvenile, but then I was a juvenile when I read it and liked it just fine. I read this a long time ago in Astounding and I really didn’t remember much about it other than it seemed enjoyable. Needle, – originally published in Astounding Science Fiction 1949 All three works have children characters and might be suitable for younger SF readers. Clement is a significant writer and the reading was enjoyable and went quickly. This collects three short novels: Needle, Iceworld and Close to Critical. NESFA (New England Science Fiction Assoc.) continues to publish excellent collections of often forgotten authors. The Essential Hal Clement: Trio for Slide Rule and Typewriter by Hal Clement , NESFA, 1998, hardcover omnibus,science fiction
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