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Known Space
The Long Arm of Gil Hamilton
ARMED FOR DEATH
Gil Hamilton was more than an operative for ARM - the elite global police force. He was an essential. His intuition was peerless; his psychic powers were devastating. And his raw courage took him into the depths of inner and outer space where others feared to tread! But Gil Hamilton had enemies. Many enemies. Some were organleggers - those murderous dealers of illicit transplants. Others were just ordinary killers. Around any corner, Gil could probably find someone waiting to kill him. In order to stay alive - and operating - he always had to be armed for death!
THREE THRILLING NOVELETTES IN THE FAMED KNOWN SPACE SERIES BY THE AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR OF RINGWORLD
Contents:
· Death by Ecstasy [“The Organleggers”] · na Galaxy Jan ’69
· The Defenseless Dead · nv Ten Tomorrows, ed. Roger Elwood, Fawcett, 1973
· ARM · na Epoch, ed. Roger Elwood & Robert Silverberg, Berkley, 1975
· Afterword: The Last Word About SF! Detectives · aw
Gil Hamilton was more than an operative for ARM - the elite global police force. He was an essential. His intuition was peerless; his psychic powers were devastating. And his raw courage took him into the depths of inner and outer space where others feared to tread! But Gil Hamilton had enemies. Many enemies. Some were organleggers - those murderous dealers of illicit transplants. Others were just ordinary killers. Around any corner, Gil could probably find someone waiting to kill him. In order to stay alive - and operating - he always had to be armed for death!
THREE THRILLING NOVELETTES IN THE FAMED KNOWN SPACE SERIES BY THE AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR OF RINGWORLD
Contents:
· Death by Ecstasy [“The Organleggers”] · na Galaxy Jan ’69
· The Defenseless Dead · nv Ten Tomorrows, ed. Roger Elwood, Fawcett, 1973
· ARM · na Epoch, ed. Roger Elwood & Robert Silverberg, Berkley, 1975
· Afterword: The Last Word About SF! Detectives · aw
182 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1976
About the author
Larry Niven
603 books3,172 followersLaurence van Cott Niven's best known work is Ringworld (Ringworld, #1) (1970), which received the Hugo, Locus, Ditmar, and Nebula awards. His work is primarily hard science fiction, using big science concepts and theoretical physics. The creation of thoroughly worked-out alien species, which are very different from humans both physically and mentally, is recognized as one of Niven's main strengths.
Niven also often includes elements of detective fiction and adventure stories. His fantasy includes The Magic Goes Away series, which utilizes an exhaustible resource, called Mana, to make the magic a non-renewable resource.
Niven created an alien species, the Kzin, which were featured in a series of twelve collection books, the Man-Kzin Wars. He co-authored a number of novels with Jerry Pournelle. In fact, much of his writing since the 1970s has been in collaboration, particularly with Pournelle, Steven Barnes, Brenda Cooper, or Edward M. Lerner.
He briefly attended the California Institute of Technology and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in mathematics (with a minor in psychology) from Washburn University, Topeka, Kansas, in 1962. He did a year of graduate work in mathematics at the University of California at Los Angeles. He has since lived in Los Angeles suburbs, including Chatsworth and Tarzana, as a full-time writer. He married Marilyn Joyce "Fuzzy Pink" Wisowaty, herself a well-known science fiction and Regency literature fan, on September 6, 1969.
Niven won the Hugo Award for Best Short Story for Neutron Star in 1967. In 1972, for Inconstant Moon, and in 1975 for The Hole Man. In 1976, he won the Hugo Award for Best Novelette for The Borderland of Sol.
Niven has written scripts for various science fiction television shows, including the original Land of the Lost series and Star Trek: The Animated Series, for which he adapted his early Kzin story The Soft Weapon. He adapted his story Inconstant Moon for an episode of the television series The Outer Limits in 1996.
He has also written for the DC Comics character Green Lantern including in his stories hard science fiction concepts such as universal entropy and the redshift effect, which are unusual in comic books.
http://us.macmillan.com/author/larryn...
Niven also often includes elements of detective fiction and adventure stories. His fantasy includes The Magic Goes Away series, which utilizes an exhaustible resource, called Mana, to make the magic a non-renewable resource.
Niven created an alien species, the Kzin, which were featured in a series of twelve collection books, the Man-Kzin Wars. He co-authored a number of novels with Jerry Pournelle. In fact, much of his writing since the 1970s has been in collaboration, particularly with Pournelle, Steven Barnes, Brenda Cooper, or Edward M. Lerner.
He briefly attended the California Institute of Technology and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in mathematics (with a minor in psychology) from Washburn University, Topeka, Kansas, in 1962. He did a year of graduate work in mathematics at the University of California at Los Angeles. He has since lived in Los Angeles suburbs, including Chatsworth and Tarzana, as a full-time writer. He married Marilyn Joyce "Fuzzy Pink" Wisowaty, herself a well-known science fiction and Regency literature fan, on September 6, 1969.
Niven won the Hugo Award for Best Short Story for Neutron Star in 1967. In 1972, for Inconstant Moon, and in 1975 for The Hole Man. In 1976, he won the Hugo Award for Best Novelette for The Borderland of Sol.
Niven has written scripts for various science fiction television shows, including the original Land of the Lost series and Star Trek: The Animated Series, for which he adapted his early Kzin story The Soft Weapon. He adapted his story Inconstant Moon for an episode of the television series The Outer Limits in 1996.
He has also written for the DC Comics character Green Lantern including in his stories hard science fiction concepts such as universal entropy and the redshift effect, which are unusual in comic books.
http://us.macmillan.com/author/larryn...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 71 reviews
February 20, 2016
This book collects three novellas in the classic detective noir genre with a futuristic twist. Though, some of the ideas may be more paleofuture. Three things make this work, even though there are moments of "but we don't use moving sidewalks in our major cities!"
1) Our hardboiled detective deals with one type of major crime: organlegging. Long before Repo! The Genetic Opera, there was Gil Hamilton, part of the UN task force that makes sure your spare body parts aren't cannibalized from your neighbor. Hamilton's world is full of medical advances in organ and tissue grafting, so you can imagine the kind of black market that's sprung up around procuring the parts. Like a police show where you only follow a vice cop, or the homicide department, The Long Arm of Gil Hamilton is dedicated to a division specialty.
2) Detective noir plus. Everything a detective does, Hamilton does with futuristic flourish. If noir detectives smoke, he does a cigarette trick with his telekinetic third hand. (A cigarette is about the heaviest thing he can manage.) If noir detectives have loving secretaries, his secretary keeps tabs on him telepathically. If noir detectives run afoul of regular city police, well--something's gotta be constant across space and time.
3) The Encyclopedia Brown wrap up. You know you love it. You come to the end of the story, and you can't wait to see how Encyclopedia Brown (or Sherlock Holmes or Shawn Spencer, etc.) is going to combine all the little clues into an obvious answer. Hamilton has exactly these sorts of revelations, but with clues you shouldn't understand. Except that the science woven through the narrative so well that a conclusion hinging on inertialess star drives is just as clear as any other "smoking gun" detail.
1) Our hardboiled detective deals with one type of major crime: organlegging. Long before Repo! The Genetic Opera, there was Gil Hamilton, part of the UN task force that makes sure your spare body parts aren't cannibalized from your neighbor. Hamilton's world is full of medical advances in organ and tissue grafting, so you can imagine the kind of black market that's sprung up around procuring the parts. Like a police show where you only follow a vice cop, or the homicide department, The Long Arm of Gil Hamilton is dedicated to a division specialty.
2) Detective noir plus. Everything a detective does, Hamilton does with futuristic flourish. If noir detectives smoke, he does a cigarette trick with his telekinetic third hand. (A cigarette is about the heaviest thing he can manage.) If noir detectives have loving secretaries, his secretary keeps tabs on him telepathically. If noir detectives run afoul of regular city police, well--something's gotta be constant across space and time.
3) The Encyclopedia Brown wrap up. You know you love it. You come to the end of the story, and you can't wait to see how Encyclopedia Brown (or Sherlock Holmes or Shawn Spencer, etc.) is going to combine all the little clues into an obvious answer. Hamilton has exactly these sorts of revelations, but with clues you shouldn't understand. Except that the science woven through the narrative so well that a conclusion hinging on inertialess star drives is just as clear as any other "smoking gun" detail.
May 12, 2016
This was another journey in to Larry Niven's Tales of Know Space - a series of stories which share a common universe which over time formed in to a loose history - I say loose as characters which enjoyed solo stories eventually resurfaced in later stories- sometimes simply because they could and other times to act as a bridge drawing the stories in to a more coherent time line. Now I will admit sometimes its fun to see this - after all its aways good to stop by on an old friend and have one more adventure - but other times it feels a little contrived. Anyway the tales in this book (a series of novellas) were set before all of that and I feel were written to tell the tales of Gil and his time with ARM.
Anyway I digress - the stories have a definite NOIR feel to them and I think that is what appealed to me most - regardless of the futuristic setting the fantastic assumptions or the advances in science there at the heart of each story a mystery and that is what I think makes them so enjoyable.
But lets not forget that this is set in the Know Space universe and so I think for me there is always the fun to spot the easter egg (although these stories were written before such a concept) where references to others stories slowly start to pull the threads together - so if the stories do not appeal there is always the intrigue of seeing such a famous series slowly evolve.
There is no guess as where next my retro reading will take me since there are still more Gil Hamilton stories to read.
Anyway I digress - the stories have a definite NOIR feel to them and I think that is what appealed to me most - regardless of the futuristic setting the fantastic assumptions or the advances in science there at the heart of each story a mystery and that is what I think makes them so enjoyable.
But lets not forget that this is set in the Know Space universe and so I think for me there is always the fun to spot the easter egg (although these stories were written before such a concept) where references to others stories slowly start to pull the threads together - so if the stories do not appeal there is always the intrigue of seeing such a famous series slowly evolve.
There is no guess as where next my retro reading will take me since there are still more Gil Hamilton stories to read.
April 26, 2020
Science fiction is a genre that can successfully be cross pollinated with other genres, often with interesting results. The Long Arm of Gil Hamilton actually consists of three interlinked novellas featuring Larry Niven's multi-limbed investigator. (Hamilton's "third arm" is a psychic construct he can use to reach through solid objects, lift very light weights, etc.) This is a fun melding of the SF and detective genres. People who have consumed endless hours of Bones, CSI, Criminal Minds, etc will probably scream as apparently no one taught Niven what a crime scene was and why it should not be disturbed when he wrote these stories in the late sixties and early seventies. But these are fun puzzles and so let's forgive Niven this tiny faux pas. He does entertain the reader mightily so he gets points for that.
May 12, 2008
More great Known Space stories. I could easily put myself in the role of Gil "The Arm".
August 8, 2022
I read this book a few years after it was first published, and the reread made me smile as it does cover subjects related to the time. There are 3 novellas and the during the first two, I kept updating to suit modern times. I think mystery/SF can be a very interesting cross genre.
October 5, 2022
Gil Hamilton is down an arm -- "How did you lose it?" she asked. "Ripped away by a meteor," I said, not without pride. -- but it's OK, he's got a sort of psychic one to replace it. And that, as one might imagine, will be relevant to these stories. He also works as an ARM agent -- "Amalgamation of Regional Militia" but Niven says in the afterword it's a backronym in the service of the larger pun. It's something like a special investigation unit charged with going after "organleggers" in a future where it's pretty easy to live a long time thanks to advanced medical technology that enables relatively easy body part transplants. The real problem is, uh, supply.
That's probably enough to understand the slightly strange flavor of this collection of three SF/mystery novelettes. As usual with Larry Niven, I liked it. Probably less than Neutron Star but up there with Ringworld.
Hard to pin down Larry Niven's voice exactly. Hard SF by strict definition but explored curiously like a puzzle, like, let's figure out how things work instead of some genius just telling us. Atmosphere mostly cynical with some dark humor, written in a minimalist economical language. He's also wildly imaginative in an understated and un-self-conscious way, with huge or crazy ideas casually tossed in and thrown away depending on how well they serve the story. Taken as a whole it scratches a particular SF itch, so he's in my regular rotation.
That's probably enough to understand the slightly strange flavor of this collection of three SF/mystery novelettes. As usual with Larry Niven, I liked it. Probably less than Neutron Star but up there with Ringworld.
Hard to pin down Larry Niven's voice exactly. Hard SF by strict definition but explored curiously like a puzzle, like, let's figure out how things work instead of some genius just telling us. Atmosphere mostly cynical with some dark humor, written in a minimalist economical language. He's also wildly imaginative in an understated and un-self-conscious way, with huge or crazy ideas casually tossed in and thrown away depending on how well they serve the story. Taken as a whole it scratches a particular SF itch, so he's in my regular rotation.
September 25, 2012
Three Detective SF novellas by Niven starring Gil Hamilton, a UN "ARM" agent working mostly on "organlegging" cases (and who, for no particular reason, also someone who possesses a psychokinetic "arm").
The detective tales are, as such, fairly labored and overconstructed, usually with an SF twist. The actual narrative is straightforward and pleasant reading.
More interesting -- as is usually the case with Niven -- the most interest is with the world-building. The series is set in Niven's Known Space book universe, in the period when humans have settled the solar system but interstellar travel and alien encounters are still in the future. The stories examine some of the effects of highly effective transplant technology and cryogenics, especially on crime (organleggers are likely to kidnap you and harvest you for black market parts) and punishment (even relatively minor crimes lead to the death penalty and legal harvest of your parts). Other concepts touched on include concepts of body and self, and the (ab)use of drouds (tech to directly stimulate the pleasure centers of the brain.
Good read.
The detective tales are, as such, fairly labored and overconstructed, usually with an SF twist. The actual narrative is straightforward and pleasant reading.
More interesting -- as is usually the case with Niven -- the most interest is with the world-building. The series is set in Niven's Known Space book universe, in the period when humans have settled the solar system but interstellar travel and alien encounters are still in the future. The stories examine some of the effects of highly effective transplant technology and cryogenics, especially on crime (organleggers are likely to kidnap you and harvest you for black market parts) and punishment (even relatively minor crimes lead to the death penalty and legal harvest of your parts). Other concepts touched on include concepts of body and self, and the (ab)use of drouds (tech to directly stimulate the pleasure centers of the brain.
Good read.
May 6, 2012
Many years after first reading it in the mid 1980s, I still recalled it with great fondness though my copy had disappeared at some point. I re-bought it and read it again in the last couple of years. I still look upon it with fondness. It's perhaps the best future-sci-fi detective type fiction I can recall. Some of Niven's best.
October 16, 2023
Cyberpunk, politics, detective work, futuristic arcologies, and the type of psionics that could have inspired Marc Miller’s original Traveller role-playing game provide the ingredients for Larry Niven’s The Long Arm of Gil Hamilton. Three separately published novellas, each featuring protagonist Gil Hamilton, a United Nations law enforcement expert with a unique psionic ability, have been collated into this 1976 anthology. It mixes genres I enjoy and it does so superbly.
In the first novella, “Death by Ecstasy,” Niven deals with addiction, suicide, and organ-legging using a patina of “current addiction,” the application of electrical stimulus to the pleasure center of the brain. I don’t think I’ve read a story that explored this in quite this way since I read George Alec Effinger’s classic trilogy beginning with When Gravity Fails. Admittedly, Effinger’s concept was broader than “mere” electrical stimulus and he published long after this story appeared in Galaxy magazine (1969). Nonetheless, the concepts of plugging directly into the brain and providing some modification is an intriguing exploration of the human/machine interface and its use as an analogy to drug addiction. Without providing a spoiler, let me just say that the resolution of the final encounter in “Death by Ecstasy” was cleverly (and in the context of the story’s fictional universe, “realistically”) done.
The second novella, “The Defenseless Dead,” was published in 1973. At that point, many were still fantasizing about cryogenics as a means to stave off fatal diseases until a cure could be developed. Niven takes that idea with its wishful thinking about immortality to explore both the political aspects of cryogenic storage (along with the cynical observations about human greed and opportunism. The case becomes personal for Gil Hamilton, the UN officer for ARM (originally the Amalgamation of Regional Militia) and the eponymous wielder of the “long arm” in the collection’s title, when he spots a former kidnap victim at a local restaurant and is victim of an attempted murder as he exits. Positing that kidnapping, organlegging, the murder attempt, and an upcoming bill to release the “corpsicles” of the preserved dead for organ transplants were connected in some way, Hamilton begins the investigation. Hamilton’s route to the ultimate bad guy in this novella is bumpy, but satisfying.
Third up was something a little different. In 1975, people were still concerned about Paul Ehrlich’s The Population Bomb. The background for this story was the implementation of Fertility Restriction Laws (more extreme version of the one-child policy in mainland China) and how it might have influenced a possible murder case. There is also an interesting feature where one of the witnesses/suspects has had a sex change operation and doesn’t want another person of interest to know. That seems to have been a facet of the story that is even more ahead of its time than the overt science-fiction aspects of the novella.
One of the two murder cases involved a time compression device related, allegedly, to an inertialess drive. The science-fiction aspects made it a classic “locked door” mystery. My favorite line in this story was a response from our ARM protagonist, Gil Hamilton, to an LAPD officer who admitted to being bothered by the machine involved in the murder: “Well, it should, Julio. The Los Angeles police were not trained to deal with a mad scientist’s nightmare running quietly in the middle of a murder scene.” (p. 154) The solutions to both murders are clever and satisfying,
In a brief afterward, Niven makes one of those statements which should be obvious, but which need to be stated regularly for the benefit of most would-be writers: “Much detective fiction is also sociological fiction…as is much science fiction…” (p. 178). As suggested earlier in this review, Niven has mixed a strong cocktail of economics, sociology, futuristic speculation, and mystery. As a result, I need to rate this extremely high on my personal scale.
In the first novella, “Death by Ecstasy,” Niven deals with addiction, suicide, and organ-legging using a patina of “current addiction,” the application of electrical stimulus to the pleasure center of the brain. I don’t think I’ve read a story that explored this in quite this way since I read George Alec Effinger’s classic trilogy beginning with When Gravity Fails. Admittedly, Effinger’s concept was broader than “mere” electrical stimulus and he published long after this story appeared in Galaxy magazine (1969). Nonetheless, the concepts of plugging directly into the brain and providing some modification is an intriguing exploration of the human/machine interface and its use as an analogy to drug addiction. Without providing a spoiler, let me just say that the resolution of the final encounter in “Death by Ecstasy” was cleverly (and in the context of the story’s fictional universe, “realistically”) done.
The second novella, “The Defenseless Dead,” was published in 1973. At that point, many were still fantasizing about cryogenics as a means to stave off fatal diseases until a cure could be developed. Niven takes that idea with its wishful thinking about immortality to explore both the political aspects of cryogenic storage (along with the cynical observations about human greed and opportunism. The case becomes personal for Gil Hamilton, the UN officer for ARM (originally the Amalgamation of Regional Militia) and the eponymous wielder of the “long arm” in the collection’s title, when he spots a former kidnap victim at a local restaurant and is victim of an attempted murder as he exits. Positing that kidnapping, organlegging, the murder attempt, and an upcoming bill to release the “corpsicles” of the preserved dead for organ transplants were connected in some way, Hamilton begins the investigation. Hamilton’s route to the ultimate bad guy in this novella is bumpy, but satisfying.
Third up was something a little different. In 1975, people were still concerned about Paul Ehrlich’s The Population Bomb. The background for this story was the implementation of Fertility Restriction Laws (more extreme version of the one-child policy in mainland China) and how it might have influenced a possible murder case. There is also an interesting feature where one of the witnesses/suspects has had a sex change operation and doesn’t want another person of interest to know. That seems to have been a facet of the story that is even more ahead of its time than the overt science-fiction aspects of the novella.
One of the two murder cases involved a time compression device related, allegedly, to an inertialess drive. The science-fiction aspects made it a classic “locked door” mystery. My favorite line in this story was a response from our ARM protagonist, Gil Hamilton, to an LAPD officer who admitted to being bothered by the machine involved in the murder: “Well, it should, Julio. The Los Angeles police were not trained to deal with a mad scientist’s nightmare running quietly in the middle of a murder scene.” (p. 154) The solutions to both murders are clever and satisfying,
In a brief afterward, Niven makes one of those statements which should be obvious, but which need to be stated regularly for the benefit of most would-be writers: “Much detective fiction is also sociological fiction…as is much science fiction…” (p. 178). As suggested earlier in this review, Niven has mixed a strong cocktail of economics, sociology, futuristic speculation, and mystery. As a result, I need to rate this extremely high on my personal scale.
December 13, 2018
Probably my least favorite of all the Known Space books that I've read so far... and I've almost read them all... I have about 3 left in the entirety of the Known Space series: The Patchwork Girl, Betrayer of Worlds, and Fate of Worlds... Then a couple of short stories that didn't make it into the main collections of Neutron Star and Tales of Known Space. So my knowlege of Known Space is almost complete... And I really do think this is my least favorite of the whole series. There are a couple short stories in Tales of Known Space that I would consider inferior to these sci-fi detective stories... most notably his earlier works, the short stories that Niven wrote before he even conceptualized "Known Space" as an overarching universe, effectually writing Known Space stories without realizing that that's what he was doing. But compared to the bulk of his Known Space series, this definitely ranks near the bottom for me.
And even though that statement is very true, like I say with all Known Space reviews where I say that "this book lands in the lower half of my ratings list of Known Space novels and stories", well, I love Known Space so much that that means that even though its maybe my least favorite of the series, I still enjoyed a lot about it. I think my favorite was probably the middle story, "The Defenseless Dead"... And even though I solved the mystery of the "who-dunnit" aspect of the detective story kind of early on in that one... I thought it was clever enough, and cool enough of a story, to make that not really matter.
All in all, I found that the brevity of the short story format is probably what hurt these stories more than anything... I don't read many detective stories (actually, I don't really read any detective stories)... but I think it felt a bit rushed at times, and much of the interrogating and the conversations seemed quite truncated... So I'm hoping that The Patchwork Girl's being a full-length novel, about roughly 3 times the length of any of these shorter novelettes, solves that issue, because I actually DID like the character of Gil "The Arm" Hamilton, and his whole "3rd arm" psi power that he has... That's another thing I think that fell short in these stories, his USE of that "imaginary" arm of his... sure, he does use it here and there, at least a couple times in each story, but not enough to really make good use of it. It becomes more of an afterthought than what it could've been, which is a true asset to his skills as a detective.
Well, that's about it... I'd recommend it to anyone who has read 80-90% of the Known Space novels and short stories... but not really to anyone who hasn't... That pretty much says is all.
And even though that statement is very true, like I say with all Known Space reviews where I say that "this book lands in the lower half of my ratings list of Known Space novels and stories", well, I love Known Space so much that that means that even though its maybe my least favorite of the series, I still enjoyed a lot about it. I think my favorite was probably the middle story, "The Defenseless Dead"... And even though I solved the mystery of the "who-dunnit" aspect of the detective story kind of early on in that one... I thought it was clever enough, and cool enough of a story, to make that not really matter.
All in all, I found that the brevity of the short story format is probably what hurt these stories more than anything... I don't read many detective stories (actually, I don't really read any detective stories)... but I think it felt a bit rushed at times, and much of the interrogating and the conversations seemed quite truncated... So I'm hoping that The Patchwork Girl's being a full-length novel, about roughly 3 times the length of any of these shorter novelettes, solves that issue, because I actually DID like the character of Gil "The Arm" Hamilton, and his whole "3rd arm" psi power that he has... That's another thing I think that fell short in these stories, his USE of that "imaginary" arm of his... sure, he does use it here and there, at least a couple times in each story, but not enough to really make good use of it. It becomes more of an afterthought than what it could've been, which is a true asset to his skills as a detective.
Well, that's about it... I'd recommend it to anyone who has read 80-90% of the Known Space novels and short stories... but not really to anyone who hasn't... That pretty much says is all.
August 6, 2018
_Death by Ecstasy_ was my first Larry Niven story, and prompted me to go out and find more of his Known Space tales. In this book Niven uses (and builds parts of) the Known Space backdrop to tell two clever and successful SF mysteries, and one that doesn't quite close the deal.
Much of the setting is build backwards: the Amalgamated Regional Militia exists to create the acronym, which itself exists to play off the central character's psi-power (an ESPer arm); ARM covers not just organlegging (murdering for black market transplant parts) but advanced technology just to justify Gil Hamilton being in the 3rd story. Still, so much of the SF mystery genre is setting dependent that the rules have to be written to make the mystery possible, and that means forgiving some forced fits in the world building. Death by Ecstasy is a remarkably evocative story, the Defenseless Dead builds on the world assumptions smoothly as a follow-up about the ethics of this world. The third tale, ARM, takes a different viewpoint of the world and ethics, but Niven admits this is the upteenth draft of this story that predates the others and you can see the wheres and whys of how it doesn't stick the landing. It's not that it's bad, it's just not great.
Are the world's ethics - the expansion of the death penalty to every conceivable crime to fill the organ banks to keep life sustaining transplants to Earth's billions - kinda nuts? Yes, yes they are. But bits of pieces of that are needed not just for some of these stories but some of the other Known Space tales, so you write it off as the classic SF "let's extrapolate this technology as far as it will go" thought experiment (and this one with organ transplants is no more or less insane/disturbing than the one Gene Wolfe does with taxidermy, so there you go).
Much of the setting is build backwards: the Amalgamated Regional Militia exists to create the acronym, which itself exists to play off the central character's psi-power (an ESPer arm); ARM covers not just organlegging (murdering for black market transplant parts) but advanced technology just to justify Gil Hamilton being in the 3rd story. Still, so much of the SF mystery genre is setting dependent that the rules have to be written to make the mystery possible, and that means forgiving some forced fits in the world building. Death by Ecstasy is a remarkably evocative story, the Defenseless Dead builds on the world assumptions smoothly as a follow-up about the ethics of this world. The third tale, ARM, takes a different viewpoint of the world and ethics, but Niven admits this is the upteenth draft of this story that predates the others and you can see the wheres and whys of how it doesn't stick the landing. It's not that it's bad, it's just not great.
Are the world's ethics - the expansion of the death penalty to every conceivable crime to fill the organ banks to keep life sustaining transplants to Earth's billions - kinda nuts? Yes, yes they are. But bits of pieces of that are needed not just for some of these stories but some of the other Known Space tales, so you write it off as the classic SF "let's extrapolate this technology as far as it will go" thought experiment (and this one with organ transplants is no more or less insane/disturbing than the one Gene Wolfe does with taxidermy, so there you go).
June 21, 2020
I'm slowly working on re-reading a lot of older books, and then passing them on to little free libraries and the used book stalls of various Friends organizations of public libraries. I've dithered over a lot of my Larry Niven collection, as he was one of the first of the "new" writers of the '60s and '70s whose works I discovered in high school or college. I still enjoy most of his stuff after all this time, and rather pity those who don't see the sociological depths he plumbs, nor the reasonably-tight science in most of his stories.
In any event, the three stories that make up this volume are far more sociology than science. The afterword that the author has appended is, in some ways, more interesting than the stories, because it gives some real insight into how a writer becomes a published author. Still, the stories are all well-done mysteries, and highly enjoyable as such. Having read this book several times in the past, I knew where each was going, but some of the details had been forgotten over time.
This is not Niven's best stuff, as he admits, but it builds some of the foundation of his later Known Space tales, particularly as to Belter Society, as well as why Humanity had nothing like a real weapon (but was quick to relearn!) when it first encountered the kzinti.
In any event, the three stories that make up this volume are far more sociology than science. The afterword that the author has appended is, in some ways, more interesting than the stories, because it gives some real insight into how a writer becomes a published author. Still, the stories are all well-done mysteries, and highly enjoyable as such. Having read this book several times in the past, I knew where each was going, but some of the details had been forgotten over time.
This is not Niven's best stuff, as he admits, but it builds some of the foundation of his later Known Space tales, particularly as to Belter Society, as well as why Humanity had nothing like a real weapon (but was quick to relearn!) when it first encountered the kzinti.
December 8, 2023
I first read this about 50 years aqo and liked it. Now, I find it mediocre and reluctantly give it just three stars. Gil Hamilton (Gil Kane, artist and Edmond Hamilton, author) is a member of ARM, the U.N. police force. Set over 150 years in the future (from 1969) in a world of 18 billion people (gasp), there is a clamour for human organs and a healthy long life, and the easiest way to get them is where increasingly minor criminals are sentenced to be taken apart for their organs. Criminals (organleggers) kidnap people and also take people apart to sell at a big profit.
Hamilton has a psychic arm which developed after he lost his right arm, and before a new human arm was fitted. The book is basically in three parts. The first two dealing with top organlggers and the third part, a future "whodunit".
Hamilton has a psychic arm which developed after he lost his right arm, and before a new human arm was fitted. The book is basically in three parts. The first two dealing with top organlggers and the third part, a future "whodunit".
July 9, 2022
Three short stories featuring Gil Hamilton, who not only works for ARM, but has a transplanted arm AND an invisible arm (read it to make sense of that). This blend of science fiction and mysteries was originally published in this form in 1976; the stories came out in the 60s-70s. I found the stories to be pleasant reads, since I like both genres.
Since society is getting conditioned to notice these things, I was interested in realizing that Niven included co-workers, suspects, witnesses, and friends of Gil in various colors and gender identities. All without making it a part of the story; this was just the way his created world was/is (USA in the 22nd century).
Since society is getting conditioned to notice these things, I was interested in realizing that Niven included co-workers, suspects, witnesses, and friends of Gil in various colors and gender identities. All without making it a part of the story; this was just the way his created world was/is (USA in the 22nd century).
January 27, 2019
Three pretty good scifi detective stories set in the crowded, prosperous world of 2120, where organ theft is a big deal, actually, you might be killed and harvested for your organs, and everything is punishable by the death penalty, so the state can seize your organs? It's weird. But the mysteries are good and the writing is breezy and occasionally funny and Niven keeps his politics out of it so it's a pretty good time
February 9, 2020
I wanted this book to have stood the test of time, but alas, it did not. The 'technology' was so dated to be just dumb and silly, while the three stories comprising this novel were hard to follow and complicated by too many characters and lack of breadth in the story.
This book did not add to my enjoyment of Niven's "Known Space" universe as I'd hoped it would. It gives almost no insight into the other books in that universe.
This book did not add to my enjoyment of Niven's "Known Space" universe as I'd hoped it would. It gives almost no insight into the other books in that universe.
June 1, 2024
I enjoyed this trio of stories, despite the noir setting, which normally puts me right off. The humour normally found in a Niven book is less evident here, as though he has not yet fully found his voice. Maybe it also seems a little darker than other books of his as it is closer in time to our own era and he takes the combination of over-population and organ transplants to a logical conclusion, which shows some of the worst of humanity.
December 27, 2023
Niven explores some interesting concepts, but his chosen noir-genre limits him in scope and character.
I would have liked to have seen more on interstellar travel, like with the inertialess drive in the third story; I also would have liked some more compelling and professional women, not just someone to spice up the main character’s life.
I would have liked to have seen more on interstellar travel, like with the inertialess drive in the third story; I also would have liked some more compelling and professional women, not just someone to spice up the main character’s life.
October 4, 2023
I read most of this sci-fi book while waiting in pretty short lines at Disneyland. Disneyland was way better! Sorry, Stephen Colbert! He recommended it on his show. I do want to try Ringworld, though.
August 19, 2018
Better than Ringworld, Niven really hits his stride in this one. Classic cheesy space detective genre. Inventive plot points.
February 25, 2019
Great sci fi detective stories. Wish there were more!
March 26, 2020
Detective sci fi.Good but dragged on a bit
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October 19, 2020A good science friction detective collection.
November 16, 2020
De la SF policière plutôt réussie.
November 21, 2020
3.5 stars, scifi pulpy goodness
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March 31, 2021It’s Larry Niven just read if you like a good story.
Read
June 3, 2021Just read the first novella. I’m kind of bored so I don’t want to continue for now.
Read
June 8, 2021I read a lot of Larry Niven during my youthful years and I remember the books fondly.
August 13, 2022
Niven yet again demonstrating his ability of blend literary genera - sci fi meets detective novel.
October 25, 2022
Honestly, the Gil Hamilton stories are probably Niven's best work. Full review: https://fakegeekboy.wordpress.com/202...
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