Pandora's Legions

By: Christopher Anvil, Eric Flint - editor

Narrated by: Wayne Mitchell

After peacefully and complacently expanding for centuries, the Centran Empire comes face to face with their first major obstacle, the stubborn and warlike inhabitants of Earth, and decides to use Earth warriors to pacify difficult planets throughout the galaxy, but they soon discover a new problem - the humans could end up running the Central Empire itself.

©2002 Christopher Anvil (P)2020 Tantor

Entertaining, but dated

Earth has been invaded by a giant alien empire. The thing is, the dominant species in that empire isn't especially bright. Note that this is a fix-up novel, built from two series of stories published in monthly SF magazines.

There are two main threads in this book:

In the first, we have the gullible aliens dealing with obstreperous Earthmen. The Earthmen can convince the aliens of the value of nearly any wild idea, with often disastrous consequences. Anvil uses these to expose many absurdities in our lives and offer what he considers a better way.

In the second, we see a military officer who is tasked with solving refractory problems for the alien empire through the kind of guile and tricks that only a smart human can come up with. These are often interesting problems, and the solutions are indeed innovative. Unfortunately, they often don't make a great deal of sense after reflection.

This book is almost the same as "Pandora's Planet", which I first read in the '70s, with just the addition of another story lampooning psychiatry (which is entertaining, but rather facile). When I read it, I thought it was brilliant, but as is often the case, it doesn't hold up as well to another reading at this remove. It's just a bit too far on the "look how clever I am" side of SF stories for lasting impact.

That said, it's still entertaining, and if I were reading it for the first time I'm sure I would still love it today. I do recommend it for what it is, but it's not the favorite book that it was 40 - 50 years ago.

Why do the "humans" sound like shrill old ladies

Really don't want to return another book because it's impossible to hear and understand. Painfully shrill! Come on now, these guys are big ape like types beating up on Lop-Tails and they sound like a Kzinti's claws dragging on a blackboard.

Two faced coin

The 2 main protagonists offer completely different styles of book from each other. The human story is good military sci fi with human ingenuity solving seemingly insurmountable problems. the cetrian(centurian?) story reads more like a crappy sci fi comedy where every single human dictator was given a free planet and told to go wild. These two stories clash massively in both tone and theme to the point where I think the author just shoved them both together in an act of desperation to complete the story. it's not irredeemable it's just jarring and a little weird.