Book Review: Thou Good and Faithful by John Brunner. (OK novella)

 

Thou Good and Faithful by John Brunner. (as John Loxsmith)

First published in the march 1953 issue of Astounding magazine.

re-published here in the Now Then! 1965 collection that I have had unopened on my bookshelf for decades. I decided to read this after reading two books about Brunner and his work – The Modern Masters of Science Fiction biography by Jad Smith and the Happening worlds of John Brunner. It was my understanding after reading this it was John Brunner’s first professional sale written when he was 16, and published in 1953 when he was 19 years old.

Brunner himself considered it his first sale, in the preface in the 1965 collection he referred to it as his first professional sale to a Science Fiction magazine. Called it his "entry into the field." That was certainly my motivation for reading it.  After reading the story I fired off a tweet referring to it as impressive as his first story sale at 16. Fellow Hoosier Science Fiction reviewer Joachim Boaz (@SFRuminations) called out my tweet pointing out that it was not his first sale and that he was 19 years old when published.

I respect Joachim and his reviews, I am glad he said something but re-reading Brunner’s preface I don’t feel bad that I didn’t have that exactly correct. Brunner clearly did not consider fanzines sales such as The Wanderers and Brainpower that were published under the name K. Houston Brunner as part of his proper works (or a major sale). More curious though was his first novel sale at 16 a CLI-FI novel written in 1951 called Galactic Storm under the name Gil Hunt. I have not read that novel, in four years Brunner would declare it a failure and would never re-edit or release it like he did many of his early novels. It is strange that Brunner seems to deny a book that addresses many of his later themes like the dangers of environmental destruction and nationalism but it is one he doesn’t think highly of. Certainly, it SHOULD be considered his first sale. Although it was this story that would really kick-start his career.

Written the same year Thou Good and Faithful is still a window into the 16-year-old Brunner even if it took three years to find a home. What a home - John W. Campbell editing Astounding one of the most popular magazines of the field and the story made the cover. Published under the name John Loxsmith the young Brunner seemed to understand that someday he might not be so proud of these early efforts. Making the cover Astounding I am surprised he didn’t use his name.

So how is the novella itself? I am going to spoil the ending, as it is a somewhat hard-to-find story and I want to discuss what this says about the seeds here of the Brunner that would evolve from this tale. Brunner stated that he was inspired by a passing remark about a robot who retired and homesteaded a planet. This was clearly Simak’s classic novel City. That novel uses a framing device of Robots and dogs telling stories about the long dying human race. The influence of Simak is clearly in a couple of aspects of the story, not the least of which is the title a direct homage to a moment where Jenkins the robot tells of early dog culture who awaited the rest of humans  to pet them “Well done, Good and Faithful Servant.”

The storytelling vibe of this novella is very Simak with a very pastoral landscape and almost fantastical living quality to the robots. That said it is very Brunner in the sense that the space travelers are looking for new homes for humans, considering the ecological devastation back home. Finding a habitable planet could make a whole career. I mean look how bleak of a picture a teenage Brunner painted in the early 50s.

“The real Earth was the place from which men would cheerfully run away to enlist as lowly troopers on a ship like this one, to be cocooned and made to hibernate while light-years ticked away, to be revived and ordered to battle stations against an enemy who might not appear, to return to mindless sleep until the time came for paying-off and discharge – most likely on some other human planet than the race’s overcrowded pock-faced homeworld.”

For a teenager now the science, social awareness, and ecological themes would be impressive as most young people are not thinking about these types of things. Besides being readable and fun the story holds up amazingly well. Keep in mind the very progressive naming of the starship captain Chang, as Brunner puts it in the text as a typical human name.  

The twist or the hook of the story is they find the world is inhabited not by life but by robots.  So the human in the story believe there is only two options – Did the Robots destroy their living creators or did the creators leave them after some natural disaster? It results in an interesting ending that also harkens back to the Simak story, the Robots can overpower the humans but make an offer. “Will you accept this planet and ourselves as a gift?”

Chang goes into the giant computer to negotiate and this is where the twist of the story expresses the theme Brunner set off trying to make. This is where the seed Brunner saw in the Simak novel blossomed into it’s own story. The machine tells Chang he never considered a third alternative for how this planet came to be.

“What third alternative?” Said Chang with the dream-like air of a man who finds himself doing the impossible.
“They gave it to us,” said the Machine.

The robots were designed to serve and look like members of their creator species who instead of expanding into space evolved into beings of pure mind leaving their creations behind who maintained the planet. The twist is that they got bored and lonely, they were excited to serve again. Then the deal was made.

I love this novella for many reasons. One that Brunner took a throw-away line in a Simak story and expanded it.  The story is clear and holds up very well seven decades after it was written. Brunner’s work would go on to become some of the smartest most politically strong and environmentally aware science fiction of the 20th century, this story written when he was 16 years old might not be the most original of his works but it shows the seeds of a master and is absolutely worth reading