Rogue Moon, A Review
By Ray Tabler
Rogue Moon is a 1960 science fiction novel by Algis Budrys, and a very strange read from the perspective of 65 years after publication. I’m not a scholar of Budrys’ work, and have only sipped at his canon, The Stoker and the Stars being most memorable. So, perhaps Rogue Moon is representative of Budrys stories. But, to me it stands out as a uniquely 1950s/60s piece of fiction.
The plot revolves around an alien ruin/ship/installation discovered on the far side of the moon. The Soviets were (in 1960) ahead in the space race, and the US government realized that extraordinary measures would be required to reach the artifact first. An experimental matter transfer project is employed to get to the moon before the Russians. The story is about exploring the alien…thing via transmitting volunteers to the moon.
The matter transfer mechanism transmits a copy of the passenger to a receiver on the moon. For a limited period of time, as long as the original back on Earth (denoted with a subscript of L, for Lab) is kept in a sensory deprivation state, he perceives what the copy (subscript M for moon) experiences. The alien things kills the copy within minutes of entry. The original experiences the copy’s death, in detail. And it tends to drive the original insane.
What the project manager, Hawks, needs is someone who can psychologically deal with death, after death, after death. He finds his man in a thrill-seeker, named Barker, who has lost a leg in a previous adventure. Barker can do the job, even if he isn’t a perfect fit. Progress is made.
Here be spoilers!
It’s impossible to describe Rogue Moon any further without tipping the author’s hand. Impossible for me, anyway.
The alien thing on the moon is only a backdrop in this story. The real drama plays out in the minds of Hawks, Barker, and the minor characters. At first glance, Barker, the daredevil, is the hero, risking his life daily, and dying each time. His courage is evident, and his casual aplomb in the face of death admirable. Hawks comes off as a scheming, manipulative, type, who readily betrays an old friend to keep the project on track.
As the novel unfolds, the motives of each man are revealed. Barker’s surface bravery conceals a deeper fear of being seen as a coward. Hawks is driven to distasteful acts because he understands how important success of the project is. After a number of death experiences, Barker reexamines his life, and his frantic thrill-seeking. The woman he thought he loved leaves him, because she found the old Barker more convenient for her and the new one too much trouble. Hawks meets a woman at random who offers a way out of his lonely, one-dimensional life.
Rogue Moon departs from what we today expect from mid-20th-century science fiction, because of the subtle psychological conflicts below the action. It’s like a wild mash up of the TV shows Madmen and Thirty Something. Both are about people in the advertising business, but one is set in the early 1960s while the other navel-gazes in the late 1980s. Not that there’s no navel-gazing in Mad Men. But Mad Men has to shoehorn that introspection into the confines of a strait-laced, masculine earlier age. Were there other, psychological science fiction stories from that period of time? I don’t know. We only remember the flashy, action-packed examples.
This novel compares and contrasts the two different types of courage Hawks and Barker exemplify. Barker’s is brash, active, and feeds on the approval of others. Hawks’ is quieter, deeper, and doesn’t care about what others think. Yet, Hawks needs a man like Barker to get the job done. And Barker needs a man like Hawks to do the thankless, dirty chores. Which kind of courage is more important, if either? Budrys hints at his opinion in the last chapter. Maybe you have a different view.
END.
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