Beyond Apollo

[as usual, minor spoilers...]

Ugh.

I want my four hours back.

Can something be pretentious and crude at the same time? Can an ostensibly science fiction novel about the first manned expedition to Venus that has more mentions of the sex act – solo, heterosexual in marriage, and homosexual innuendo – than the word “Venus” win a major award? Can rambling, disconnected verbal diarrhea result in a satisfying, conclusive, thought-provoking enlightening experience?

Yes, Yes, and No.

Look, I get what Malzberg is driving at. I know having “Venus” as your subject implies a possible exploration of sexual themes. The book was published in 1974, so you know it has to be hip, antiestablishment, anti-literary, edgy. Yes, I get that. So was Thomas Disch’s Camp Concentration, which is the work that kept popping into my head as I read Beyond Apollo. Both novels are written as first-person journals of men who may or may not be insane. And while I thought Disch’s book a worthwhile read, I was only able to get to the end of Apollo because the chapters are short and I was hoping against all hope that the end would wrap everything up.

It’s like someone throwing a bunch of jigsaw puzzle pieces at you and saying, “Hey man! This is the most awesome thing you’ll see! It won an award! Put it together, and you’ll see.” Only problem is, you have no idea what the picture is and as you put it together, you realize you’re missing about half the pieces.

For 153 pages we read the words of Harry M. Evans – an astronaut who happens to be the sole survivor of the first manned mission to Venus, in 1981. His commanding officer, the Captain, was killed, and though we’re given a couple of different possible death scenarios throughout the book, we’re never told exactly how, or why. Evans is schizophrenic, switching back and forth between first- and third-person narration. He could have killed his commanding officer, or the “Venusians,” who mentally contact the crewmen – maybe – and warn them to keep away. Arty, but unsatisfying.

The premise is good but I don’t feel Malzberg quite pulls it off. He’s doesn’t stay true to the old “psychic aliens are warning mankind away” kind of thing we saw a lot of in the 1950s. He doesn’t have to, mind you, but if he starts to monkey around with reader expectation he needs to replace it with something better. Be more mind-bending than those alleged Venusians. All he gives us is sad-sack Evans moaning over his cold wife and failed marriage and how he was hot for his Captain. May I remind you that there’s 153 pages of this?

Yeah, I’m disappointed. Malzberg has great street cred, though, so I’ll read more of his stuff as I come across it. But as far as Beyond Apollo goes, the only thought I found myself entertaining during the last half of the book was a kind of meta-theme: Can a book be labeled a “science fiction” book if the only “science fiction” takes place allegedly in the mind of the protagonist? I mean, replace “Venusians” with “Injuns” and the “first manned mission to Venus” with the “lead-up to Little Big Horn,” and you could construct a similar book. Or “Venusians” with “Nazis” and “first manned mission” with “escaping a POW camp.” This was the unintended mental exercise bouncing about my badly bruised brain as I closed the book on Beyond Apollo.