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3.42 AVERAGE
3.42 AVERAGE
I really enjoyed the writing style and I thought Parker was a very real feeling human. But it could also feel a little repetitive at points. I think this book’s biggest downfall is that it built up so much that there was no way to end it “neatly”. The conclusion was fine but it left me wanting more- feeling like the audience didn’t get all the answers we were expecting.
My favorite character (minor spoiler) was the taking dog. I deducted half a star because he wasn’t in the story nearly enough for me.
Summary
Parker Graves, science reporter, finds a trap laid for him at his front door one night. He avoids it, but there are plenty of other strange things going on in town - things that no one else is likely to believe.
Review
They Walked Like Men is in some ways the kind of story Simak did best – the adventure of an unassuming, matter of fact every man in strange circumstances. Here, he draws on his own newspaper background with a science reporter protagonist encountering aliens.
The aliens themselves are, broadly speaking, a prop. There are two varieties of alien, but the principal one is featureless and mysterious, and mostly useful for setting up a strange situation our reporter has to investigate. They fade away toward the end, and in fact the ending has little detail, treating the remaining practical cleanup as trivia that need not be discussed.
The story is very much of its time in gender roles – there’s a supportive, loving woman, but that’s all she’s really there for. Our male protagonist is the one in charge, and deals mostly with other men.
Despite all that, the story is eminently readable, largely because that protagonist is so firmly engaging; he’s just pleasant to spend time with. The story runs long, with a latter half that gets bogged down in broad philosophy with no particular goal. But Parker Graves just seems like a good guy, and there’s enough intrigue to keep things moving.
This doesn’t have the calm, contemplative feel of Simak’s best short stories, but it does have a nice, down to earth humanity about it, and it’s a nice read, if not an essential one.
This pulp cosmic noir novel is bizzardly relatable even today.... Legality it's not equal to morality.
Something is happening economically in the small town where Parker Graves is a newspaper reporter. People in the community can’t find housing. Some mysterious entity is buying the houses. The community’s only department store is about to close. Again, the purchaser is a mysterious entity who has ordered the store shut down, and no one knows who the buyer is or why.
On a night when he has had a few drinks—ok, a lot of them—Graves sees what looks like a trap in front of his apartment door. Someone removed a circular piece of carpet. Not long thereafter, he sees things in the shape of bowling balls moving in his field of vision. It’s just the booze, right? It’s just sleep deprivation, true?
No, it’s an alien invasion, and before the book ends, Parker and his love interest, Joy, will have discovered the frightening nature of the conspiracy against we mere Earthlings.
I enjoyed this book immensely. You grieve with Graves when he realizes that no one will believe him. In a business that trades on credibility, Graves is in serious trouble. You also celebrate the genius of an author who details an alien invasion, not from military perspectives, but from economic ones. Fascinating indeed! You’ll have to read it to better understand my point.