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Simak, Clifford D.
THEY WALKED LIKE MEN
book-date: 1962
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GRADING:
Manor Books
1975

Paperback
Art/Design: Tony Destefano
.95
VG to VG-
ex-ChUSFA: stamp on first inside page, page 85. MORE INFO

A novel by Clifford D. Simak: They Walked Like Men. This is one of his good and strange ones from the Sixties. I have a fondness for totally off-the-wall plots, if the author can pull it off (and Simak does this one perfectly.) One of his 5 best novels, in my opinion.

[The flap copy: first is a quote from the book...]
I stood in the darkness and felt the terror closing in. And when I tried to put a finger on the terror, there was nothing there. For it wasn't terrible; it was comic - a trap set outside the door, a pack of bowling balls trundling sedately down a country lane. It was the stuff cartoons are made of. It was something that was too ridulous to believe. It was something that would send you off into helpless guffaws even as it killed you.

Parker Graves, a newspaperman, comes home one night to discover that a trap has been laid outside his apartment door. To his horror, the trap is transformed into a bowling ball and runs away. The entire city soon becomes a scene of strange happenings - buildings are bought up at a fantastic rate, leases aren't renewed, established businesses are closed, and people can't find places to live. Parker investigates the situation, and after many adventures - some hair-raising, some humorous - discovers the reasons for these bizarre events.