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A review by kynan
The Stainless Steel Rat Sings the Blues by Harry Harrison
2.0
TL;DR: A passable sci-fi adventure masquerading as a Stainless Steel Rat story.
TL: The story starts out in the expected fashion with the "young" James diGriz engaged in a suitably far-fetched larcenous activity : robbing the Mint planet (mint as in money, not mint as in delicious flavour). As might be expected, things don't go entirely to plan and young, multi-talented Jim ends up in charge of a strange little search party sentenced to a rather difficult search 'n retrieval project on the prison planet Liokukae.
The first third of this book is very much in the mould of a Stainless Steel Rat story, but it gets less and less Stainless Steel Rat and more and more generic (for want of a better term) sci-fi adventure. Somewhat of necessity, James is stripped of his usual semi-magical offensive and defensive equipment and, in a bit of a departure from the Stainless Steel universe, the planet on which Jim finds himself is not entirely homogenous in population and purpose! This means that the environment serves almost as another character, there's an element of mystery and discovery as Jim and crew learn more about where we are and what's going on along with us. This isn't something that has been a feature of the series until now, usually preferring to follow along in Jim's spectacular wake, marveling at his escapades. diGriz is still very much the focus of this story, but he's not the only focus of the story and it makes for a very different, and not unwelcome read.
The story itself isn't groundbreaking and, in my jaded state (don't read all of these books consecutively) I found myself not enjoying the story. However, after planetfall the story actually changed tack and, with a few twisty turns toward the end, it was if not actively enjoyable, at very least a welcome and interesting change.
The grating bits were Mr Harrison's usual ham-handed:
- digs against "male chauvinist pigs": quotes like "Are these weirdos what the psych books call male chauvinist pigs?" just don't ring true and don't fit the prequel timeline very well at all;
- digs against the military: who get a(nother) thorough sarcastic bashing;
- rants on the joys of libertarianism: although less in-your-face than the social commentary of [b:The Stainless Steel Rat Gets Drafted|710706|The Stainless Steel Rat Gets Drafted (Stainless Steel Rat, #2)|Harry Harrison|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1328049909l/710706._SY75_.jpg|929350], there's no shortage of it here. There's also a weird obsession with the book [b:Iron John: A Book About Men|122600|Iron John A Book About Men|Robert Bly|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348052112l/122600._SX50_.jpg|604566], and a need to (I think) disabuse people of its veracity? This might just fall into the same category as the virtue-signaling anti-male-chauvinist-pig stance from above perhaps?
That's my major gripe list, although there were a couple of other things that also didn't help: For barely sane reasons, Jim is teamed up with a band for this little escapade and this, unfortunately, leads to a number of songs being written and sung throughout the story, they're horrific.
Overall, not a terrible book, not a great book. It's somewhere between 2 and 3 stars, not something one should go out of one's way to read. There are the usual deus ex machina (for what would the Stainless Steel Rat be without them!) and a lot of Jim's usual escapology and luck as he battles the various dastardly denizens in an effort to discover the secrets he's been blackmailed into uncovering.
TL: The story starts out in the expected fashion with the "young" James diGriz engaged in a suitably far-fetched larcenous activity : robbing the Mint planet (mint as in money, not mint as in delicious flavour). As might be expected, things don't go entirely to plan and young, multi-talented Jim ends up in charge of a strange little search party sentenced to a rather difficult search 'n retrieval project on the prison planet Liokukae.
The first third of this book is very much in the mould of a Stainless Steel Rat story, but it gets less and less Stainless Steel Rat and more and more generic (for want of a better term) sci-fi adventure. Somewhat of necessity, James is stripped of his usual semi-magical offensive and defensive equipment and, in a bit of a departure from the Stainless Steel universe, the planet on which Jim finds himself is not entirely homogenous in population and purpose! This means that the environment serves almost as another character, there's an element of mystery and discovery as Jim and crew learn more about where we are and what's going on along with us. This isn't something that has been a feature of the series until now, usually preferring to follow along in Jim's spectacular wake, marveling at his escapades. diGriz is still very much the focus of this story, but he's not the only focus of the story and it makes for a very different, and not unwelcome read.
The story itself isn't groundbreaking and, in my jaded state (don't read all of these books consecutively) I found myself not enjoying the story. However, after planetfall the story actually changed tack and, with a few twisty turns toward the end, it was if not actively enjoyable, at very least a welcome and interesting change.
The grating bits were Mr Harrison's usual ham-handed:
- digs against "male chauvinist pigs": quotes like "Are these weirdos what the psych books call male chauvinist pigs?" just don't ring true and don't fit the prequel timeline very well at all;
- digs against the military: who get a(nother) thorough sarcastic bashing;
- rants on the joys of libertarianism: although less in-your-face than the social commentary of [b:The Stainless Steel Rat Gets Drafted|710706|The Stainless Steel Rat Gets Drafted (Stainless Steel Rat, #2)|Harry Harrison|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1328049909l/710706._SY75_.jpg|929350], there's no shortage of it here. There's also a weird obsession with the book [b:Iron John: A Book About Men|122600|Iron John A Book About Men|Robert Bly|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348052112l/122600._SX50_.jpg|604566], and a need to (I think) disabuse people of its veracity? This might just fall into the same category as the virtue-signaling anti-male-chauvinist-pig stance from above perhaps?
That's my major gripe list, although there were a couple of other things that also didn't help: For barely sane reasons, Jim is teamed up with a band for this little escapade and this, unfortunately, leads to a number of songs being written and sung throughout the story, they're horrific.
Overall, not a terrible book, not a great book. It's somewhere between 2 and 3 stars, not something one should go out of one's way to read. There are the usual deus ex machina (for what would the Stainless Steel Rat be without them!) and a lot of Jim's usual escapology and luck as he battles the various dastardly denizens in an effort to discover the secrets he's been blackmailed into uncovering.