Planet of the felinoids.(Man-Kzin Wars X: The Wunder War)(Book Review)

Man-Kzin Wars X: The Wunder War, by Hal Colebatch; Bach, 2003, $45.

THE CONCEPT of science fiction can repel. It can be bleak, pretentious, obscure, or horrific, and the element of actual science can bore and confuse. However, Hal Colebatch's four tales of the man-kzin wars have an appeal that extends far beyond the ranks of science fiction enthusiasts.

The four stories combine a strong narrative, necessary exposition and sympathetic, credible characters. It is an achievement of itself to expand and enhance the created world of an established science fiction writer, Larry Niven. From Niven's imagination sprang the kzin, eight-foot felinoids who combine technological expertise and extra-sensory perception with the raw savage courage of the tigers they so resemble. Niven has permitted other writers to contribute further episodes in the death struggles and occasional collaboration between humans and kzin, ranging across the universe some 400 years in the future. Hal Colebatch has certainly met Niven's standards of quality control.

Colebatch's four stories relate to an imaginary planet known as Wunderland, part, of the Alpha Centauri star system, closest to our own at a distance of four light years (the science component of the book is unobtrusive and believable). Possessed of oxygen, water, arable land, a temperate climate, 60 per cent of Earth's gravity, with some dangerous but exotic locations and creatures on the fringes of settlement, it has been successfully colonised by humans of English and German descent. A thinly spread and technologically privileged population enjoys the luxury of cosy factional enmities, and regards the solitary monastery as a quaint survival.

This is the world attacked by the kzin, who combine physical strength with animal savagery and who ruthlessly use advanced weaponry. They are well removed from sentimental notions of "noble savages", but they possess the virtue of courage and respect it in their adversaries. In kzin society only senior officers and a few NCOs of exceptional bravery even have names; because those kzin with mind-reading powers, the telepaths, are puny, nameless runts, these non-physical abilities are unwisely despised.

Humans are given the stark choice of becoming prey and slaves, or fighting against the odds. Thus the first and longest story, "One War for Wunderland", tells of the kzin invasion; the second, "The Corporal in the Caves", of an episode during the human resistance to the kzin occupation; and the third, "Music Box", occurs after mankind has obtained the technological supremacy to defeat the kzin and liberate the planet.

There is no lack of action and excitement, but the stories are essentially character-driven. Two characters in particular serve as unifying threads between the first three stories. Nils Rykermann, the academic-turned-warrior, is the narrator of "One War for Wunderland" that ends with the apparent loss of his beloved Dimity Carmody. In "The Corporal in the Caves", told from the kzin perspective, he and his wife Leonie are desperate resistance fighters; and in "Music Box" he must make the hard choice of siding with kzin-hating "exterminationist" humans or accepting some kzin as respected allies. Colebatch gives us a moral journey in step with the narrative.