Book Review – Herovit’s World by Barry N. Malzberg

I started reading a few Malzberg novels in around 1999, when I was about 18. Unfortunately, these books were quite hard to find locally (here in Perth) as they were all out of print. Malzberg wrote about 30 science fiction novels, most of which were written and published in the first half of the 1970s. Very few of those were ever reprinted, and there are a grand total of three Malzberg books in print by my estimation (see Writers of Interest – Barry N. Malzberg for more on this). So what I’m saying is that Malzberg novels are hard to find, and yet at least some of them are well worth finding.

It’s not all bad news, however. Online booksellers such as abebooks.com are swimming with old editions of Malzberg novels, many of which are as cheap as $1 each. It’s a sad situation in that Malzberg’s books are underappreciated, but good news for someone wanting to load up on Malzberg novels on the cheap. At a guess, I would say that you could collect most if not all of Malzberg’s better novels for something like $50, including postage.

Malzberg’s most famous novel is almost certainly Beyond Apollo, the book which won him the John W. Campbell Award in 1974. That one is well worth reading (if a little overrated in comparison with Malzberg’s other books). Other more commonly found novels include Galaxies (which has at least been reprinted occasionally) and Herovit’s World, which is one of Malzberg’s most popular novels. Of Malzberg’s thirty or so novels, I would select the following as the best ten:

Beyond Apollo

The Falling Astronauts

The Men Inside

Herovit’s World

Galaxies

The Cross of Fire

The Remaking of SIgmund Freud

Underlay

Gather in the Hall of the Planets (as by K. M. O’Donnell)

Revelations (I haven’t actually read this one but I hear it’s good.)

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OK, onto my review of Herovit’s World. This is a book is a parody that concerns the life of an imaginary hack science fiction writer by the name of Jonathan Herovit. Herovit has written 92 novels in the ‘Survey Team’ series under the name of Kirk Poland. Now Herovit is trying to write book 93, but he’s not having too much success. His marriage to his wife Janice is on the rocks, he has an infant daughter named Natalie that neither parent seems to care too much for, he lives in a miserable little apartment in downtown Manhattan, and he’s a hopeless alcoholic. In short, Herovit is in big trouble. His agent is demanding that the new novel be completed in quick time, but the writing is agony. We get snippets of Herovit’s ”Survey Team’ novel, with its indomitable protagonist Mack Miller, throughout Herovit’s World<!–. And the Survey Team book is a real stinker. Some of the passages need to be read aloud to appreciate how poor they are.

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As an escape from the confines of his life, Herovit increasingly turns to the bottle: Scotch to be precise. And he consumes vast quantities of it on a daily basis. Meanwhile, he’s lucky to churn out 5 pages a day. For a hack accustomed to writing a book in as little as three days, this is a glacial pace. Most of Herovit’s World consists of description of Herovit’s writing woes, his increasingly bitter arguments with Janice, and conversations with another science fiction writer, Mitchell Wilk. Wilk is older than Herovit, perhaps more successful, and (importantly to Herovit) he gets the girls too. There are also scenes ofHerovit’s daily encounters with the Manhattan locals (including a visit to a prostitute).

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None of this really captures the essence of Herovit’s World, and indeed Malzberg’s craft in general. This is a book about despair, failed ambitions, alcoholism, and mental instability. If this paints a bleak picture, then you’re starting to get the idea, but there’s nothing pedantic or earnest about any of this. Malzberg’s gift is that he turns the bleakest of situations into uproarious black humour. An example. Herovit is dreaming of sex:

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‘”[Herovit] does what he can to draw the seed from himself, yanking it like threads tightening in his cells, and at last he is finished or in any event he quits (after five or six who can tell the difference?), lying then stunned and sated beside the girl. He knows that he will never think of sex again in his entire life. What a relief this will be!”

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Here I have neglected to describe one of the key elements of this book. Herovit the writer begins to receive visitations from his alter-ago, Kirk Poland, who offers to take over Herovit’s life for him. Herovit resists at first, but as his life becomes completely unbearable, he caves into Poland’s demands. Henceforth, it is Poland, not Herovit, whom this novel concerns. Unfortunately, Poland proves just as incapable of managing Herovit’s affairs, and the situation deteriorates further. Finally, Mack Miller (Poland’s Survey Team protagonist) makes an appearance in reality, taking over from Poland. Mack Miller is even less well equipped to deal with the realities of urban life in the late twentieth century, and the novel ends in complete estrangement (Miller regards the humans in the room with him as aliens). It all ends badly, needless to say.

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Herovit’s World is a quick read. Malzberg reportedly wrote all of his novels in record time, and to be fair to him, it shows. There is a sort of diffuse quality to most of Malzberg’s work (Galaxies being a notable exception). By this I mean that the whole novel feels like it has been stretched out over a greater length than the material truly deserves. I have always found it best to read Malzberg’s novels as they were written: i.e. fast). This is a quick read, but a funny one. Highly recommended for anyone with a dark sense of humour.