2. Herds by Stephen Goldin

They’re moving in herds. They do move in herds. — Dr. Alan Grant, Jurassic Park

With Raymond F. Jones‘s Renegades of Time behind us, it’s time to ring in the New Year with Stephen Goldin’s first Laser Books entry.

This will not be the last tale we get from Goldin either; as mentioned in my previous review, this author spun four yarns across the run of 58 Laser Books. Guess we’ll see if his talent merits repeat appearances.

But first, of course, we must pay due deference to the almighty Kelly Freas and his cover art.

Cover

O-ho, delicious!

This book is very much a tale of opposites: light versus dark, generosity versus greed, community versus self-centredness. Freas captures that expertly with his use of contrasts: cold and warm colours juxtaposed in two opposing parts of the frame. Note how the Zartics occupy a lofty, heavenly position over Wesley Stoneham (the portrait) who is surrounded in a lower, baser position by the flames of hell.

By placing a shining bright star above the Zartic city — a star which calls to mind that which shone over Bethlehem which caught the attention of wise men from a far distant country to bring gifts to Christ’s crib — Freas suggests that the Zartic way of life (communal, unselfish) might be the ideal we all should aspire to.

Would You Like to Know More?

There have been many scientific attempts to explain the Star of Bethlehem in the two thousand years since it occurred. This article by Astronomy explores some of those theories.

Additionally, check out Arthur C. Clarke‘s landmark science fiction short story, “The Star”, for a truly heartbreaking study of this odd question mark in the annals of history.

Also, even though Freas is following a formula prescribed for these covers by Harlequin, he still manages to reflect Stoneham’s ego by making his head appear just a hair (ha-ha) larger than his comrades on the other Laser Book covers.

I don’t even feel like I can make jokes about this, it’s just a solid, well thought out cover. Great work, Freas!

Blurb

The wife of a powerful figure in California is found brutally murdered in the couples’ lonely mountain retreat. Wesley Stoneham made certain that all the evidence concerning the murderer of his wife pointed to a nearby hippie community. He had three goals in mind: to get rid of his wife, to drive out to the hippie commune and to enhance his own power in the State. He was at the point of achieving them all when Garnna, from the peaceful planet of Zartic finally made contact with Debby, a hippie from the commune, who had problems of her own. Then Stoneham’s troubles began.

Looks like we got ourselves a good old-fashioned “howcatchem?” with a sci-fi twist! Unlike other Laser Books blurbs, it feels like the premise of a New Wave sci-fi tale, rather than a Golden Age one: a corrupt politician as a villain, a hippie from a commune for a heroine, and an alien from across the stars as a trusty sidekick. Golden Age stories typically position politicians as authority figures (or at worst, harmless buffoons), hippies as deviants, and aliens as either angels or demons.

Actually, I can think of a fair few Golden Age short stories by Arthur C. Clarke that have similar premises: an alien helping a human put right what once went wrong. But in a post-Watergate world, a story like this takes on a new sense of urgency — and Watergate was only three years old by the time Herds was published.

Again, I can’t really make jokes. The blurb works! So why don’t we just dive right in and see if this book is all that it promises?

Story

Oof, this hits too close to home…

The book reads exactly like an episode of Columbo (the episode I’m thinking of is “Candidate for Crime“, which aired two years prior to Herds‘ publication… and one year after Watergate… hmm) which is one of my favourite shows, so that alone pushes all the right buttons for me.

Would You Like to Know More?

If you haven’t seen Columbo, or you’re already a fan who craves some behind-the-scenes trivia, check out the comprehensive and sprawling Columbophile Blog. Here, you’ll find reviews of every single Columbo episode (including the two TV movies that first gave us the Lieutenant), series facts, and rankings of the best (and worst) of actor Peter Falk’s outings as the iconic detective. And, if you are a newcomer and want a taste of what this show has to offer, the blog also has links to a handful of full episodes free on YouTube!

But what I love most about this book is the commentary on power and society, and how we view certain people as credible and others as incredible. Stoneham, as a politician, naturally curries favour with other politicians, local law enforcement, and the media. His attempt to pin his crime on a minority is a base, cynical act, but sadly one which feels all too familiar in Donald Trump’s America.

Full Disclosure: I read this book a year before Trump got re-elected, and looking back through its pages for this review today is a chilling experience.

In addition to the quote above, I’d like to share with you a couple more passages from the book — a book written, I’ll remind you, in 1975. The interlocutors are Dr. Polaski, an anthropologist studying the hippie commune, and Sheriff Maschen, who is investigating Wesley Stoneham:

“If you could boil all the current troubles of the world down into a single word, sheriff, what would it be?”

Maschen thought as best he could, but his brain was not functioning at its sharpest this morning. “I don’t know. What?”

“Divisiveness. The splintering off of groups from the whole, the alienation of the individual from his group, and the sheer polarity between groups. Have you noticed that moderation has seemed to become a thing of the past? People are no longer able to agree to disagree anymore; they’re either violently in favor of something or just as violently opposed. Individuals are feeling more and more set apart from the society in which they’re living, which increases tensions. The groups, instead of trying to settle differences, actually go around looking for new ways to disagree. Each group becomes hardened against the problems of another, and then each one splinters into a myriad of sub-groups, and the cycle is repeated. — Herds, pages 170-171

Ask yourself: how many times have I had this conversation with my friends and family lately? How often have I heard it at work or in the classroom? How clearly do I feel that I am seeing this every day?

The discussion is not new — in truth, it’s probably thousands of years old — but how keenly these words cut in the year 2026 A.D.

And further on, another character asks Polaski:

“But you must have some theory as to causes,” Simpson persisted.

“I do, yes, but I hesitate to state them when I can’t substantiate them. It would be a ridiculous oversimplification to blame any one factor, but I think that one of the primary causes is modern rapid communications. In the space of just a few generations, we have moved into a position where we can know instanteously what is gonig on anywhere else in the world. We never had that ability before, and consequently we find ourselves faced with worries over food riots in Kurdistan that we would never have even thought about a century ago. There are suddenly too many things that must be cared about, and our minds, which are unused to so many complications, rebel. In order to preserve sanity, they narrow their attention to one specific field and ignore — or worse, despise — all others. Society, which should be a cohesive whole in order to be most effective, is breaking down to a collection of narrow-minded individuals who care nothing for anyone but themselves and their group. And we’re going to have to learn how to treat this problem on an immense scale before our world becomes any saner.” — Herds, page 172

Wow.

This is what I meant in my first post about the Laser Books that some of these titles should still be talked about. Herds is a story about an self-centred egoist who believes he has just enough power to commit a murder and get away with it.

And you know what?

He would have.

It takes the intervention of a psychic alien to find the evidence that will put Stoneham away. But even then, Goldin intimates that Stoneham might not actually see jail time, that the real victory is that, with this murder allegation hanging round his neck, he will never reach the corridors of power.

But recall the Chappaquiddick incident, six years prior to Herds‘ publication, in which Teddy Kennedy’s reckless driving killed Mary Jo Kopechne and he got away with it.

Or how about That Bad Man who orchestrated a failed insurrection, and was re-elected to the U.S. Presidency four years later? He got away with it.

The most haunting thing about Herds as a book is that it throws the faults of our society into stark relief. Ask yourselves who’d win: a politician with a faultless track record, or a frazzled, pot-smoking hippie girl who says she gets visions from the planet Zartic?

I really love the various symmetries that exist in this story. The commune and Zartic represent similar utopian societies. Debby and Garnna are both iconoclasts who believe in getting involved and challenging authority. Humanity and the Zartics face similar problems of burying their heads in the sand in the face of great trouble.

But most of all, I love how the stakes reflect the moral question at the centre of the book: “Who has credibility… and why?”

Conclusions and Recommendations

One of the annoying publishing guidelines of the Laser Books is that the protagonist has to be a man. Consequently, even though Debby is the centre of the story, she’s not allowed to be the sole driver of the plot. Goldin is forced to bring in Sheriff Maschen, Dr. Polaski, and a few other boys to help Debby along. This is really the biggest fault with Herds. When these men appear, they crowd out Debby, who truly deserves the lion’s share of screentime.

Other than that… there’s actually nothing wrong with this book. I vibed with it the whole way through and read a handful of my favourite passages to my family. I actually wished it were longer so Goldin could have more room to examine each of the book’s social environments — the police station, the commune, Zartic — in greater detail. My Goodreads review, therefore, will be very positive:

This is a book for our times. The premise of a politician trying to pin his crime on a minority is always relevant, but is especially biting today with Donald Trump in the White House. The plot reads exactly like a classic NBC-era Columbo episode: a “howcatchem” as opposed to a “whodunnit”. Stakes are both high and personal, as you don’t want Wesley Stoneham anywhere near the levers of power in America, and the only one standing in his way is a woman whose credibility he’s determined to destroy. The only thing I would wish different is that that woman, Debby, received a greater share of screen time as opposed to being pushed aside for Big Strong Men to tell her how they’re going to catch Stoneham. An easy recommend from me!

I’d love to talk more about this book, but we’ve barely scratched the surface of the Laser Books, so we’ll bid adieu to Herds and Stephen Goldin. Grieve not; we’ll see him again in Laser Book 8, Caravan!

But for now, on deck we have… hold on… *squints at list*

Who’s Next?

*sigh* Next is… Crash Landing on Iduna by Arthur Tofte.

Blurb

When a spaceship crashes, the survivors are in peril for their lives. When the planet and its inhabitants are unknown to the survivors, fear becomes tangible among them. When the survivors are a crippled man and his four children the odds against survival increase dramatically. When the entire family has lived a controlled, docile, protected life and has been deliberately kept passive by the managers of the society on earth from which they came, the situation looks hopeless. But when two of the survivors are Peder and Inga Evenson there is always hope. This is their story.

… I need a drink.