The Cometeers Author:Jack Williamson The second of a three book Legion series: Legion of Space, The Cometeers, and One Against the Legion. — This book is a sequel to the author's book "The Legion of Space," and revisits three of the characters from that novel--The glutton locksmith Giles Habibula, the personality-free (and kind of wasted character of a)giant Hal Samsa, and the decis... more »ive and action-oriented leader Jay Kalam--as well as the son of the young John Star from the first book--Bob Star!
The book was written in 1936 as a magazine series--a year in America, and in New Mexico (Williamson's home state), very worthy of escapism, due to the economic depression and the Dust Bowl. It's very dated, but at least it's dated in a funny way. For instance, they have rockets and have harnessed the power of the sun for insanely fast acceleration (geodynes), yet the rocket captains keep track of the ship's records with fountain pens in ledgerbooks, and they listen to phonographs.
The story tells of a comet twelve-million-miles wide that comes to invade the solar system and how they use it up for food and fuel, several centuries in the future. Once again the Legion of Space is called to save the day, on orders from the Green Hall (a.k.a. Albuquerque).« less