Gunner Cade & Takeoff

Cyril Judd was the pen-name used by SF husband and wife writing team C. M. Kornbluth an Judith Merrill for this collaboration.In the far-flung future, soldiers, called "gunners" live as members of monastic-like orders. They fight only other gunners, who serve other lords, and all serve the Emperor. Unknown to them, the general public follows their exploits with sports-fan-like fascination -- how many kills does this gunner have, etc.Cade is an ordinary gunner, proud to serve. By a tremendous combination of coincidence and conspiracy, he is captured by the underground, who try to program him for their own purposes. He escapes, only to find himself a wanted man, branded a traitor, with all gunners ordered to kill him. But along the way he meets this girl, see, and in his quest to find her, he finds himself involved in a DIFFERENT underground conspiracy, and the girl turns out to be the Emperor's neice, naturally, and before you know it we're on a rocketship to Mars to the secret rebel base and...GUNNER CADE is great pulp SF. It has the sense of wonder, the rip-roaring plot, the "Oh, wow" moments, along with numerous pungent observations on government, religion, sex, etc. Written in 1952, it fulfills it's mission of entertainment magnificently. Kornbluth and Merrill were such talented writers; it's a shame they couldn't have written at a time when publisher would allow a SF writer 300 pages to fully flesh out a story (as opposed to today, when even marginal writers get 400 pages fo "Volume One of the Chronicles of Boredome Octology).

The book is written under c.m. kornbluth's pen name. It concerns a fugitive "soldier" on the run from the empire. He has given his life to the empire and now he finds that he is a fugitive. With the help of an underground organization he finds more than what he bargains for thus entering a new phase in his life. A very easy read, fun, and a prime example of an excellent writer who died young.