REEL

by Laurence M. Janifer ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 18, 1983

Mobster maneuvers, interstellar style: a hackneyed non-idea inflated to novel length with circumambulations, irrelevant literary quotations, and the effusions of no less than seven different first-person narrators--from a writer who's probably better known to sf fans as Mark Phillips or Larry Mark Harris. The policeless planet Reel is the Las Vegas of space, dedicated to gambling, whoring, drink, drugs, and tourist-bedazzling iniquity in general. Callow, diffident Alex Yonge and his distant father run the casinos; tough madam Margaret Sunday operates the bordellos. But mobster Wyss Diamond is planning a takeover, and soon Alex's father is killed by a Diamond underling. Meanwhile Alex is attracted to down-and-out Earth tourist Christie Chesson, but she's enslaved in the torture division of a Sunday brothel. Then Diamond and his heavies invade and defeat Sunday; along comes Alex and his gang to mop up the bad guys; and a grateful Sunday yields him up his girl. Verbose and empty, despite the garish wall-papering.

Pub Date: Nov. 18, 1983

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1983

Categories: FICTION