Greed
3/5
()
About this ebook
Is Greed good? The future of Earth and all of mankind may hang on that one question. And George Marquis Lorrilard—a space age ace-pilot, adventurer and fortune-hunter to rival Hans Solo of Star Wars—is just the man to answer it.
The world is divided between Asia and the United Continents—two great super powers locked in eternal warfare. But the balance of power is about to shift in Asia’s favor. They have developed a top-secret weapon—the cohesion projector–that could lead to annihilation on an unprecedented scale.…
But as far as Lorrilard is concerned, the number one problem with the projector is that it stands in the way of his profits. Can he find a way to subvert the powerful weapon and resume his enterprising exploits through leadership and self deception? For millions of people on Earth survival may ultimately depend on the power of one man’s need speed and Greed.
Greed was the last L. Ron Hubbard story published in Astounding Science Fiction in April 1950, marking the end of an era. Over a decade before, he had been a key figure in the opening of the Golden Age of Science Fiction. Now, as he turned his attention to other writings, the Golden Age drew to a close. But some three decades after this story appeared, Hubbard would make a triumphant return to the field with the publication of his bestselling novel Battlefield Earth and the extraordinary ten-volume series Mission Earth.
Also includes the science fiction adventures, The Final Enemy, in which Earth discovers it faces a distant, yet devastating new foe, the identity of which is the most shocking blow of all, and The Automagic Horse, the story of a Hollywood special effects wizard who is about to apply his movie magic to a project that is out of this world.
“A wonderfully rich and textured experience, complete with realistic sound effects and moody atmospheric music.” —Publishers Weekly Listen Up Award winner for 2008
New York Times Bestselling Author
L. Ron Hubbard Fiction Book
L. Ron Hubbard
With 19 New York Times bestsellers and more than 350 million copies of his works in circulation, L. Ron Hubbard is among the most enduring and widely read authors of our time. As a leading light of American Pulp Fiction through the 1930s and '40s, he is further among the most influential authors of the modern age. Indeed, from Ray Bradbury to Stephen King, there is scarcely a master of imaginative tales who has not paid tribute to L. Ron Hubbard. Then too, of course, there is all L. Ron Hubbard represents as the Founder of Dianetics and Scientology and thus the only major religion born in the 20th century.
Read more from L. Ron Hubbard
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Reviews for Greed
5 ratings9 reviews
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Interesting stories from a dated but historically telling point of view. Not cutting edge anymore, but good classic fun, and with a stylish air. Short book of long stories!I will reiterate the point of earlier reviewers: a biography of Hubbard without a mention of Scientology is questionable.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5A very fast read, and the three short stories that make up the book are imaginative, if compact. You can see how the authors of this pulp genre had to shoehorn a piece into a given space and crank it out as quickly as possible. Make a buck and move on to the next story. The premise that each story is based on is usually making an assumption that reader is going to understand all the "modern science" used in the piece. Not a lot of time or space for scientific fact or character development.An enjoyable read for the most part out on the patio with a glass of wine, and not a lot that you would have to remember as with our current crop of seemingly endlessly sequeled scifi and fantasy grand operas. Go with the times it was written as a mindset and with that little bit of wonder we all started out with, and just enjoy a brief diviersion.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5I have found stories to be somewhat enjoyable, but there's all kinds of issues, like to much insertion of stuff like advertising and rather long "history" attachment for author of books.Ignoring all period problems like light racism and others in stories... Greed is fairly boring read. Second story "Final Enemy" is fairly slow read, but not much of a surprise as the concept were over used by now, but in least it was an okay read. The last story is most enjoyable one of all, with decent characters and story, but at some points it just falls flat.$10 is simply too much for 3 short stories. Its bound in fake hardcover style with flaps, adding nothing but to price. The stories themselves is written in fairly large font to pad book thickness, with additional stuff to pad it out even more. The story preview "Behind all weapons", glossary, rather long "l. Ron Hubbard in the Golden Age of Pulp Fiction", and finally advertising at end of book takes up fully 1/4 of book thickness. Oh that middle of book insert that's permanently part of bind even if I remove it, leaving tiny stub? That's bad...Short story, a clunker of a book with only 3 short stories you can finish in a hour or so that costs $10. Buy some other thicker book that you can take days to read for $8.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5L. Ron Hubbard's "Greed" is a post-war science fiction morality tale told by a master storyteller. By the time "Greed" was published in the pages of Astounding Science Fiction magazine Hubbard had produced an astonishing body of fiction encompassing every genre: air-adventure, western, sea adventure, crime stories, far-flung tales in exotic locales, fantasy and tales from the Orient. "Greed" is typical of his output - well-written and fully realized. This edition includes two bonus stories - "Final Enemy" which is yet another classic, and the renowned "The Auto-Magic Horse." It's difficult to pick a favorite because all three are so good, but I'd have to lean in favor of "The Auto-Magic Horse." I own a rather battered copy of the original October 1949 issue of Astounding Science Fiction where "The Auto-Magic Horse" first appeared. Part Hollywood satire, part science fiction, "The Auto-Magic Horse" is a stand-out gem from L. Ron Hubbard. As always I am recommending the superb audio book from Galaxy Press in addition to the paperback. These audio books are the best on the market. The vocal talent includes David Paladino, James King, Jim Meskimen, Tamra Meskimen, Noelle North, Jeff Pomerantz, Phil Proctor, Enn Reitel, Josh R. Thompson and Michael Yurchak. The primary narration is provided by R. F. Daley who has the best voice in the audio book industry.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Good set of stories. As a child I enjoyed L. Ron Hubbard's work and reading these returned me to an earlier time. Quite fun reading.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Very fun sci fi story. edgy
- Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Being moderately familiar with L. Ron Hubbard's public persona but having not read any of his works, I requested this book from the LibraryThing's Early Reviewers program. I've read some fine science fiction stories written in the Cambell era (1930's and 40's) and gathered that these stories published by the Astounding Science Fiction magazine during that time might be at least entertaining, if not up to my literary standard of science fiction.
The book "Greed" contains:
An introduction by Kevin J. Anderson that exalts the "Golden Age of Science Fiction" and was successful in hightening my excitement at reading the stories, particularly because he says stories of that time were "drawn by plot and character."
The short story, "Greed" (first appearing in Astounding Science Fiction, April 1950) turns out to be a hackneyed and poorly-flowing plot of a story suggesting that the elimination of culturally different entities by way of greed can be accomplished by one great heroic figure--and that the result is but the greatest reward: the successful expansion of humankind throughout the galaxy. As its premise is ridiculous and the writing of low quality I must give it a half-star rating.
The short story, "The Final Enemy" (first appearing in Super Science Stories, September 1950) improves in plot and the story is moderately engaging and better paced. The ending of the story contains a well-used twist that has been repeated many times since in science fiction, that made me exclaim "ugghh" and "what?" instead of "wow." Rating: two stars.
Neither of these first two short stories contained any scientific speculation or exposition of merit; neither of them were astounding or super by any means. Instead, speculation was rampant throughout to paint "orientals" (asians/russians/soviets) as categorically evil. There is some question whether they were chosen by Hubbard specifically due to the current political situation at the time the story was written or if they as a group were only random victims. The two stories suggest that Hubbard preferred that evil and good were represented as opposing racial and/or political groups.
The longer short story, "The Automagic Horse" (first appearing in Astounding Science Fiction, October 1949) introduces a strong main character, some imaginative gadgets (though without any true scientific exposition), and Hollywood studios as the opposing force. The story is a solid science fantasy (as suggested in the title) and was enjoyable due to some sensawunda. The story is interrupted by an advertising insert for buying into the Galaxy book club. I didn't find the male characters especially appealing, and their misogynist banter with the enemy distanced me. Rating: two stars.
There follows a teaser of another story that is published in another Galaxy volume. I didn't read it. I did read the short biography of L. Ron Hubbard following and I have no comment. The last several pages of the book contain the list of all his stories available or to be published by Galaxy Books, whose address suggests it is owned and operated by the Church of Scientology and cement the notion that they will be publishing only Hubbard's "Stories from the Golden Age." I suggest instead stories by A. E van Vogt, Robert A. Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, and Theodore Sturgeon.
Skip this book. Unless the font is reduced to 6 point (and printed on cheaper paper, as it was originally) it truly isn't worth the paper it's printed on, much less $10. Final rating: one star. - Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Greed, published by Galaxy Press, is part of their "Stories from the Golden Age" series, which republishes all of L. Ron Hubbard's old pulp magazine stories in book form. This volume contains three science-fiction stories: the titular "Greed", as well as "Final Enemy" and "The Automagic Horse". I'm always open to trying new authors, but I wasn't about to dive into Hubbard's massive Battlefield: Earth or his Mission Earth dekalogy; Greed gave me a nice entry point. The stories in this volume, however, were fairly lacking.The title story, "Greed", is the most boring of the bunch, and for all of its length there's very little plot. Instead, the story reads much like a historical textbook entry regarding the main character. And where I'm able to (generally) look past the racism inherent in the old pulp stories of H. P. Lovecraft or Robert E. Howard, Hubbard's use of "Asians" as the go-to bad guys really put me off for some reason."Final Enemy" is mildly more successful, owing somewhat to its short length. There's a nice twist at the end, and the Asians are presented in a better light here. It's nice enough, I guess, but not enough on which to recommend the entire book.The longest story by far—running as long as the other two combined—is "The Automagic Horse", and is a vastly different animal. Where the first two are outer-space stories, this one features a group of Hollywood effects people whose special effects studio is a front for building a rocket ship. But the plot revolves around the construction and fate of a mechanical horse. I liked this one for the most part, too, though it turned fairly predictable halfway through. There was one rather sexist line that didn't bug me as much as it probably should :) though it did stick out.There is one aspect about this book that bugged the heck out of me, though I've tried not to let it influence my review, as it has nothing to do with the stories themselves. Rather, it has do with Galaxy Press's presentation of the stories. The book itself is roughly 150 pages long; 100 of that is comprised of the three stories. The rest is basically devoted to praising L. Ron Hubbard and/or pimping the rest of the "Golden Age" series. There's an introduction by Kevin J. Anderson, an absurdly-brief preview of another volume in the series, and a lengthy biography on L. Ron Hubbard. Oh, and did I mention that Galaxy Press is run by the Church of Scientology? According to Wikipedia, many of the "facts" put forth by the Church of Scientology regarding Hubbard's life are either unconfirmed or just plain false, and the biography in this book is ridiculously hyperbolic. In short, the whole endeavor feels like a money-grab, right down to the "subscribe now!" postcard bound into the middle of the book. Preserving Hubbard's old pulp stories in book format is a worthy enterprise, and it's a good-looking little book, but $10 for 100 pages of mediocre story is milking it. (And there are 80 volumes!) Consolidating everything into, say, a dozen $30 hardcovers would seem like a much more honest approach.Overall though, it's just not a strong batch of stories. Certainly not worth the $10 cover price, but this and other volumes might be worth picking up used for a couple bucks if you're interested in pulp-era stories. [2 out of 5 stars]
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Greed included 3 separate short stories written by L. Ron Hubbard. I enjoyed the first two stories in the collection; Greed and The Final Enemy. The third story I had to drudge my way through. What is great about reading these older science fiction stories is the ability to see the political and social attitudes of the times. With each story you could see how and why the author choose to use the "Asians" as a protagonist if you keep in mind the era the story was written. With that in mind, it also became clear that the stories themselves are outdated and no longer fresh. With the second story, the twist at the end is almost a science fiction cliche now. It was definitely still fun to see it coming but once you saw it you just shrugged your shoulders like you've seen it a million times. As for the last story, I didn't even think it fit well with the preceding stories. It seemed out of place in the collection and also felt like the most out of date story which made it that much more difficult to get into. Anyone who is a science fiction fan, particularly of pulp fiction, will enjoy these short stories.
Book preview
Greed - L. Ron Hubbard
SELECTED FICTION WORKS
BY L. RON HUBBARD
FANTASY
The Case of the Friendly Corpse
Death’s Deputy
Fear
The Ghoul
The Indigestible Triton
Slaves of Sleep & The Masters of Sleep
Typewriter in the Sky
The Ultimate Adventure
SCIENCE FICTION
Battlefield Earth
The Conquest of Space
The End Is Not Yet
Final Blackout
The Kilkenny Cats
The Kingslayer
The Mission Earth Dekalogy*
Ole Doc Methuselah
To the Stars
ADVENTURE
The Hell Job series
WESTERN
Buckskin Brigades
Empty Saddles
Guns of Mark Jardine
Hot Lead Payoff
A full list of L. Ron Hubbard’s
novellas and short stories is provided at the back.
*Dekalogy: a group of ten volumes
TitlePgArt.jpgPublished by
Galaxy Press, LLC
7051 Hollywood Boulevard, Suite 200
Hollywood, CA 90028
© 2008 L. Ron Hubbard Library. All Rights Reserved.
Any unauthorized copying, translation, duplication, importation or distribution, in whole or in part, by any means, including electronic copying, storage or transmission, is a violation of applicable laws.
Mission Earth is a trademark owned by L. Ron Hubbard Library and is used with permission. Battlefield Earth is a trademark owned by Author Services, Inc. and is used with permission.
Horsemen illustration from Western Story Magazine is © and ™ Condé Nast Publications and is used with their permission. Cover art and thumbnail cover on back; Greed and The Automagic Horse story illustrations; Fantasy, Far-Flung Adventure and Science Fiction illustrations and Story Preview and Glossary illustrations: Unknown and Astounding Science Fiction copyright © by Street & Smith Publications, Inc. Reprinted with permission of Penny Publications, LLC.
ISBN 978-1-59212-566-1 ePub version
ISBN 978-1-59212-369-8 print version
ISBN 978-1-59212-243-1 audiobook version
Library of Congress Control Number: 2007927677
Contents
FOREWORD
GREED
FINAL ENEMY
THE AUTOMAGIC HORSE
STORY PREVIEW:
BEYOND ALL WEAPONS
GLOSSARY
L. RON HUBBARD
IN THE GOLDEN AGE
OF PULP FICTION
THE STORIES FROM THE
GOLDEN AGE
FOREWORD
Stories from Pulp Fiction’s Golden Age
AND it was a golden age.
The 1930s and 1940s were a vibrant, seminal time for a gigantic audience of eager readers, probably the largest per capita audience of readers in American history. The magazine racks were chock-full of publications with ragged trims, garish cover art, cheap brown pulp paper, low cover prices—and the most excitement you could hold in your hands.
Pulp
magazines, named for their rough-cut, pulpwood paper, were a vehicle for more amazing tales than Scheherazade could have told in a million and one nights. Set apart from higher-class slick
magazines, printed on fancy glossy paper with quality artwork and superior production values, the pulps were for the rest of us,
adventure story after adventure story for people who liked to read. Pulp fiction authors were no-holds-barred entertainers—real storytellers. They were more interested in a thrilling plot twist, a horrific villain or a white-knuckle adventure than they were in lavish prose or convoluted metaphors.
The sheer volume of tales released during this wondrous golden age remains unmatched in any other period of literary history—hundreds of thousands of published stories in over nine hundred different magazines. Some titles lasted only an issue or two; many magazines succumbed to paper shortages during World War II, while others endured for decades yet. Pulp fiction remains as a treasure trove of stories you can read, stories you can love, stories you can remember. The stories were driven by plot and character, with grand heroes, terrible villains, beautiful damsels (often in distress), diabolical plots, amazing places, breathless romances. The readers wanted to be taken beyond the mundane, to live adventures far removed from their ordinary lives—and the pulps rarely failed to deliver.
In that regard, pulp fiction stands in the tradition of all memorable literature. For as history has shown, good stories are much more than fancy prose. William Shakespeare, Charles Dickens, Jules Verne, Alexandre Dumas—many of the greatest literary figures wrote their fiction for the readers, not simply literary colleagues and academic admirers. And writers for pulp magazines were no exception. These publications reached an audience that dwarfed the circulations of today’s short story magazines. Issues of the pulps were scooped up and read by over thirty million avid readers each month.
Because pulp fiction writers were often paid no more than a cent a word, they had to become prolific or starve. They also had to write aggressively. As Richard Kyle, publisher and editor of Argosy, the first and most long-lived of the pulps, so pointedly explained: The pulp magazine writers, the best of them, worked for markets that did not write for critics or attempt to satisfy timid advertisers. Not having to answer to anyone other than their readers, they wrote about human beings on the edges of the unknown, in those new lands the future would explore. They wrote for what we would become, not for what we had already been.
Some of the more lasting names that graced the pulps include H. P. Lovecraft, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Robert E. Howard, Max Brand, Louis L’Amour, Elmore Leonard, Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Erle Stanley Gardner, John D. MacDonald, Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein—and, of course, L. Ron Hubbard.
In a word, he was among the most prolific and popular writers of the era. He was also the most enduring—hence this series—and certainly among the most legendary. It all began only months after he first tried his hand at fiction, with L. Ron Hubbard tales appearing in Thrilling Adventures, Argosy, Five-Novels Monthly, Detective Fiction Weekly, Top-Notch, Texas Ranger, War Birds, Western Stories, even Romantic Range. He could write on any subject, in any genre, from jungle explorers to deep-sea divers, from G-men and gangsters, cowboys and flying aces to mountain climbers, hard-boiled detectives and spies. But he really began to shine when he turned his talent to science fiction and fantasy of which he authored nearly fifty novels or novelettes to forever change the shape of those genres.
Following in the tradition of such famed authors as Herman Melville, Mark Twain, Jack London and Ernest Hemingway, Ron Hubbard actually lived adventures that his own characters would have admired—as an ethnologist among primitive tribes, as prospector and engineer in hostile climes, as a captain of vessels on four oceans. He even wrote a series of articles for Argosy, called Hell Job,
in which he lived and told of the most dangerous professions a man could put his hand to.
Finally, and just for good measure, he was also an accomplished photographer, artist, filmmaker, musician and educator. But he was first and foremost a writer, and that’s the L. Ron Hubbard we come to know through the pages of this volume.
This library of Stories from the Golden Age presents the best of L. Ron Hubbard’s fiction from the heyday of storytelling, the Golden Age of the pulp magazines. In these eighty volumes, readers are treated to a full banquet of 153 stories, a kaleidoscope of tales representing every imaginable genre: science fiction, fantasy, western, mystery, thriller, horror, even romance—action of all kinds and in all places.
Because the pulps themselves were printed on such inexpensive paper with high acid content, issues were not meant to endure. As the years go by, the original issues of every pulp from Argosy through Zeppelin Stories continue crumbling into brittle, brown dust. This library preserves the L. Ron Hubbard tales from that era, presented with a distinctive look that brings back the nostalgic flavor of those times.
L. Ron Hubbard’s Stories from the Golden Age has something for every taste, every reader. These tales will return you to a time when fiction was good clean entertainment and the most fun a kid could have on a rainy afternoon or the best thing an adult could enjoy after a long day at work.
Pick up a volume, and remember what reading is supposed to be all about. Remember curling up with a great story.
—Kevin J. Anderson
KEVIN J. ANDERSON is the author of more than ninety critically acclaimed works of speculative fiction, including The Saga of Seven Suns, the continuation of the Dune Chronicles with Brian Herbert, and his New York Times bestselling novelization of L. Ron Hubbard’s Ai! Pedrito!
Greed
GREED
IT can be said with more than a little truth that a society is lost when it loses its greed, for without hunger as a whip—for power, money or fame—man sinks into a blind sloth and, contented or not, is gone.
There were three distinct classes of men who made up the early vanguard into space —and they were all greedy.
First were the explorers, the keen-eyed, eager and dauntless few who wrenched knowledge from the dark and unwilling depths of the universe.
Next were the rangers, called variously the space tramps,
space nuts
and star hobos,
who wandered aimlessly, looking, prospecting, seeing