Envoy to new worlds

Laumer, Keith. Retief: Envoy to New Worlds. 1963. Retief No. 1. Baen, 1987.
Imagine that James Bond turned in his license to kill for a good course in martial arts and a career in extraterrestrial diplomacy. That brings you close to Keith Laumer’s Retief. He is a diplomat in Earth’s Corps Diplomatique Terrestrienne. Their job is to spread goodwill to new races and keep their interstellar competitors from gaining influence. The Corps suffers from a bad case of red tape and rank inflation, but in any given mission, whatever his putative rank, Retief is always the third man in the diplomatic pecking order. At the top is a self-absorbed, grossly incompetent ambassador. The satirical attack on him reminded me of Joseph Heller’s satire show more of the military in Catch 22, published just two years before Envoy to New Worlds. The ambassador’s second in command is the well-meaning but none-too-bright Magnan. Retief is always Magnan’s subordinate. Magnan is often assigned to keep Retief out of trouble but usually needs to be rescued himself. Retief is observant and can always tell the good guys from the baddies, because unlike his colleagues, he bothers to learn the alien languages. He is always the epitome of cool. Retief began, I think, as a character in the science fiction pulps. Laumer recycled the stories in several collections, and the character became a 30-year favorite. This earliest collection was fun to reread. 4 stars. show less

As you learned in a recent episode of Rodent's Digest, I try not to bother reviewing or rating books that already have huge numbers of reviews and ratings because my little warblings just get lost in the noise. So I'm not going to rate all of the Retief books. This may be the only one, in fact. But I assure you, I have read them all. Some I've read several times, in several seasons. They are among the select few SciFi books I've carted around with me for decades. They're simply amusing. Like Godiva chocolate, with zero calories. Because of Retief, I love diplomats. Yes, if I were a lady, I'd do Retief. I've written characters who would do Retief, no questions asked. I mean, if you want clever, debonair Terran diplomatic males, look no show more further than Retief. He's kind of the suave James Bond of galactic diplomatic circles. Too bad his superiors don't have a bloody clue what's going on most of the time... show less

Lightweight fluff. A pleasant diversion.

I started reading the SF pulps in the early 60s, and remember enjoying--well, not these specific stories, but Laumer's Retief stories in general. They are entertaining and clever, but mostly that's it. Retief gets a diplomatic assignment, carries it out by not following procedures, and somebody else--usually Magnun--gets credit for saving the situation from obvious disaster.

I notice the other reviewers liked this book better than I did, so YMMV. So be it.

Hilarious! Though I would say the level of humor is not always the same in each story. Laumer did experiment. Still, Laumer is one of the few unsung greats of humor SF.

This was the first book by Keith Laumer that I read during my teenage fascination with science fiction. After reading several of Laumer's other novels, he quickly became one of my favorite writers in that genre.

I read this as a teenager and loved it. I'm pleased that it holds up as well as it does.

Best Sci-Fi Ever Written!

By far the greatest sci-fi series ever written. Follow James Retief and Ben Magnun on thier action packed, tounge-in-cheek adventures across the galaxy.

The Retief series started out as a series of short stories published the various science fiction pulps during the 1950's through to the 1960's. These are classic sci-fi as it was written before the days of the moon landing. All together there were more than 60 stories about Retief's space adventures.

After the death of Keith Laumer, editors began to compile collections of these classic pulp fiction stories into a book series. Each collection contains 3 to 5 or more stories.

Of the series Retief and the Warlords is my fave!

If you like Douglas Adams' show more Hitchhicker's Guide to the Galaxy than you're sure to love Retief. show less