Gary-Palmer@LADC (07/09/85)
From: Gary Palmer <Gary-Palmer%LADC@CISL-SERVICE-MULTICS.ARPA> I enjoyed seeing the "reasons" why an alien race might visit Earth and, for their own reasons, want to remove humans. Now I wonder if anyone else has ever read a delightful book called _Ballroom_of_the_ _Skies_ by John D. MacDonald. Yes he is the one who wrote the Travis McGee series. This book is hard to find but one of most enjoyably light yet thought provoking readings I have found in a long time. It is published by Fawcett Gold Medal Books and copyrighted 1952. The blurb on the back cover asks the questions: "Have you ever stopped to wonder why the world is eternally war-torn? Why men of good will, seeking only peace, are driven relentlessly to further disaster?" Well I won't spoil the story, but it does involve a very novel reason why aliens would come to Earth. I recommend this book to anyone who can find it. On the side, I also recommend his other book _Wine_of_ _the_Dreamers. ******************* SPOILER WARNING ******************************* Ballroom of the Skies is about one man who notices some ranking government officials seem "wrong". On further investigation he finds them being replaced by some sort of robot. He is an investigator, so he persues this and finds that aliens are on earth walking around and just "being one of the guys". They have a belt with some amazing technology to help do things like mind probing/sheilding and teleport- ation. The hero, Branson, becomes known to these aliens and starts to work for them only after long hard attempts to destroy them. He does it voluntarily after learning that they aren't out to destroy the Earth, it's people, or it's resources (a refreshing change). The end of the book presents the final reason why the aliens are controlling the ruling class of Earth; they want to keep it primitive enough where it is always engaged in wars because wars train generals. The alien race is peaceful and hence their generals are useless and the galactic defense organization needs people who can wage and win wars... There is alot of fun stuff in the book like the androids and psionics and such. I really can't do it justice, but now you have an idea what it's about. Gary Palmer--Los Angeles Ca.