Chilish, seemingly omnipotent extraterrestrial prankster show up one day and create mayhem in human society. Deeply regressive but original and more thoughtful that it looks like. ( )

Le délire de Fréderic Brown dans toute sa splendeur. ( )

http://home.comcast.net/~tonydal/wise... ( )

It seems like every time I try to make room on my bookshelves by getting rid of a few books I end up pulling out this novel and rereading it. Somehow, it always makes the cut and goes back on the shelf. It's not spectacular, but rather a nice, amusing little tale that one can devour in a couple of hours. Simply put, the book is about a Martian invasion of Earth. Unlike The War of the Worlds however, the Martians here aren't out to conquer the Earth. Instead they've come to observe and heckle it. To quote the back cover of the Del Rey October 1981 edition, Brown's Martians were "obnoxious green creatures who could be seen and heard, but not harmed, and who probed private sex lives as shamelessly as they probed government secrets." It makes for an amusing tale, and for something first published in 1954, it reads quite well. Aside from obvious anacrhonisms like typewriters (remember those?) and the cold war, the story could have been written today. (Or maybe I'm just getting old.) So, I guess I'll just have to find another book to dispose of and put Martians, Go Home back where I found it.
--J. ( )