This volume includes the story Nemesis from Terra by Leigh Brackett and Battle for the Stars, byt Edmond Hamilton. There are two significant distinctions for this volumes. The two authors represented  were married to each other and one of the stories was previously included in the Ace Double series. The Tor Double was originally published in May 1989.

The Nemesis from Terra was originally published as “Shadow Over Mars” in Startling Stories in Fall, 1944. It was previously published as part of an Ace Double (F-123, with Robert Silverberg’s Collision Course) in 1961.  The Nemesis from Terra is the first of three Brackett stories to be published in the Tor Doubles series.

Although set on Mars in the far future, as with many of Brackett’s Martian stories, The Nemesis from Terra feels more like a fantasy novel than a science fiction novel. It is a descendant of the Mars of Edgar Rice Burroughs and could easily be classified with the stories of Robert E. Howard, neither of which is a surprise.

Rick Urquhart is the main character of the novella, although to call him a protagonist gives him more agency than he really has. From the earliest pages, in which he ducks into a doorway to avoid the anthropoid Martians who are tracking him down and hears an old woman prophecy that his shadow will extend over Mars until the final pages, he is more reactive to events, whether they are forcing him into a course of action or he is attempting to avenge wrongs perpetrated on him.

His life isn’t entirely horrible. While escaping the clutches of the evil Terran Exploitation Company, run by Ed Fallon and his henchman Jaffa Storm, Rick meets Mayo McCall, and the two fall instantly in love, although there seems little reason for their affection. Rick is also the subject of Kyra’s love, a young winged Martian girl, who sees in him the future of Mars.

Of more interest that the plot or Rick himself, is Brackett’s complex depiction of her Martian society. Made up of humans and Martians, the humans, like Fallon, are looking to exploit the planet. There seem to be multiple races of sentient Martians who are not unified. The Martians led by Haral, the last of his line, possess the Collar of Ruh, which signifies legitimacy to rule. The Thinkers are a legendary race of Martians who may have plotted out the planet’s history before disappearing. The winged race to which Kyra belongs lives in their own city, mostly not venturing forth.

Brackett briefly explores all of these civilizations, as well as Fallon’s Company, his competitor, Hugh St. John, and briefly mentions regulatory agencies which deal with Martian and interplanetary trade. The result is a complex society, but one which Brackett is not able to fully explore and Rick is buffeted by all of their forces to fulfill the old woman’s prophecy.

Although the prophecy regarding Rick is uttered in a small, secluded room, the contents of the prophecy become generally known without agency. Although Rick initially fights against the idea that he will one day rule Mars, a concept which puts a target on his back for all of the various entities Brackett has created. However, Despite the love that Mayo and Kyra seem to feel for him, Rick’s self-centeredness makes him hardly a sympathetic figure for the reader. Not evil, especially when compared to Fallon and Storm, Rick doesn’t seem to believe in anything and never really changes. His motives are almost entirely self-preservation and vengeance. Even Mayo, who purportedly loves him questions whether the prophecy is right about him and whether she wants to see him succeed. The only complete affection for Rick that is shown is by Kyra, who Rick seems to see more as a tool to be used than as a person.

Brackett’s complex Martian society demonstrates that even at this early stage of her career, this was her first novel, although she had been publishing short stories for eleven years, shows her strengths. While characterization is a weakness in The Nemesis from Terra, that is also an area in which Brackett would eventually improve.

Although Brackett and Hamilton first met in 1940, they didn’t marry until 1946 and remained together until his death in 1977. Brackett survived her husband by thirteen months, during which time she worked on the first draft of a sequel to Star Wars, which was ultimately not used, although she received a writing credit on the film The Empire Strikes Back.

Battle for the Stars was originally published as a stand-alone novel by Dodd, Mead in November, 1961. Edmond Hamilton began publishing in 1926, and although his earliest stories appeared in Weird Tales and were Lovecraftian and Howardian in their feel, he eventually turned his attention to science fiction, writing the 1940s Captain Future stories. And eventually for DC Comics. He gained the nickname “World Wrecker” for the wake of destruction that occurred throughout his stories.

Given that reputation and the title Battle for the Stars, it would seem clear that this novel, which was originally published in 1961, would not only include the promised battle of the title, but also the destruction of worlds, although as it happens, Hamilton shies away from that trope in this novel.

Commander Jay Birrel leads the Fifth Squadron and reports to Ferdias, the leader of Lyra Sector, one of many galactic sectors that is jostling for supremacy in a galaxy in which Earth has fallen to a backwater planet. Lyra sector’s main rival is the Orion Sector, and the novel opens the one the Orion’s agents, Taucer, attempting to torture Birrel, who manages to escape.

Birrel is ordered to lead the Fifth Squadron to Earth, not to invade the planet, but to serve as an emissary from Lyra on the occasion of the bicentennial of the first spaceflight. Ferdias is aware that there are rumors that he is trying to conquer the Earth, and in addition to assuring Birrel that it isn’t the case, he tells Birrel that the Fifth Squadron will be accompanied by a variety of other ships that includes the civilian dependents of the soldiers of the Fifth Squadron.

To make things more interesting, Birrel is married to Lyllin, a Lyran woman who has no desire to leave her native planet, but understands that Birrel’s duty can splash onto her. She is more concerned about the fact that three of Birrel’s ancestors are from Earth, giving him closer ties to the planet than most, and she worries about the planet’s pull on him and whether they will ultimately be able to return to Lyra or if he will chose to remain on Earth, a notion Birrel finds ridiculous since he has never visited the planet and has no real desire to.

Birrel and Lyllin’s relationship is one of the weaker points of the novel. The two characters don’t really seem to know each other or even talk to each other. If Lyllin makes her concerns known, Birrel pushes them aside. He orders her around as if she were serving on one of his ships without noticing that she is his wife and doesn’t feel she should have to follow his order.

However, Hamilton’s strength shows through in his treatment of the political situation. When ordered to Earth, Birrel reminds Ferdias that he is not a diplomat, but his dealings with the Terrans Charteris and Mallinson help move the Lyran agenda along. At the same time, Despite Birrel knowing that the Lyrans are on Earth merely to help celebrate the bicentennial of spaceflight, the reader is constantly wondering if Charteris and Mallinson are correct that the Lyrans desire to conquer the Earth. Ferdias clearly hasn’t told Birrel everything and the reader can only surmise the plans that have not been revealed to him.

Part of Birrel’s orders involve him visiting the small town of Orville, New York, where his great-grandfather lived. Although his connection in Orville doesn’t go as intended, Hamilton creates a welcoming small town that remembers when Birrel’s ancestors lived there and welcome him as one of his own, despite his protestations. These sections display a nostalgia that is not typically associated with Hamilton’s writing and Orville almost feels like the sort of rural community Clifford D. Simak wrote about.

Ultimately, the Terrans must decide whether they distrust the Lyrans or the Orionids more, for if the Orionids attack, as Birrel believes that will, they will need Lyran help to fend them off, but the rumors swirling are that any attack on each will come from the Lyrans. The fact that Birrel is raising the alert level of the Fifth Squadron in response to his believes about the Orionids only causes the Terrans to take actions that make him continue to raise the alert level, making the Terrans that much more sure of his intentions.

The political situation facing Birrel and the Terrans is complex, but at the same time, it seems overly simplistic. Hamilton has created a system in which, although his focus is on the Lyrans, Terrans, and Orionids, there are several other sectors that come into play. On a more micro level, once Birrel arrives in Orville, the very friendliness of the locals raises questions of paranoia. Which of them are in the employ of the Orionids or the Terrans. Which of them hold a grudge against Birrel for something done by his ancestors. The personal aspects of Orville adds an entire unexpected facet to the story.

The cover for The Nemesis from Terra was painted by Tony Roberts. The cover for Battle for the Stars was painted by Bryn Barnard.

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Steven H Silver is a twenty-one-time Hugo Award nominee and was the publisher of the Hugo-nominated fanzine Argentus as well as the editor and publisher of ISFiC Press for eight years. He has also edited books for DAW, NESFA Press, and ZNB. His most recent anthology is Alternate Peace and his novel After Hastings was published in 2020. Steven has chaired the first Midwest Construction, Windycon three times, and the SFWA Nebula Conference numerous times. He was programming chair for Chicon 2000 and Vice Chair of Chicon 7.