“Happy Ending” is a 1957 science fiction short story by Fredric Brown and Mack Reynolds. It is about a defeated commander who goes to Venus to live out the rest of his days in isolation.
Inspired by Etaoin Shrdlu
Ever since hearing about Ivy’s book I have had a desire to try out some Fredric Brown stories. Lucky for me that Project Gutenberg has several of them freely available online. Not knowing anything about them I just picked one at random and went with it. Yeah, it turned out to be pretty good.
Stupid Neighbors!
Mr. Smith was once the supreme dictator of a great civilization – and then the Martians came… and The Jupiter Satellite Confederation. Pretty soon his civilization wasn’t so great anymore, and he was running for his life! Where did he go to hide out from the new rulers? Venus. Yep, he plunked down on a nice, lonely beach near the forest with only birds, ants and a handful of backward natives as neighbors. Aaah, you would think that would be a nice, relaxing retirement – but no. It seems that Mr. Smith is having some problems with his “neighbors” and they are starting to drive him crazy. Just when he can stand it no more he comes up with a plan to get rid of them – except, well, things don’t go according to plan. And the term “happy ending” doesn’t mean quite what you think it does!
My Two Cents…
- I really liked the writing style employed in “Happy Ending”. The descriptions were good and the story was easy to read.
- The flora, fauna and natives of Venus were really interesting to read about. I especially liked the ant creatures and their army-ant like behavior. Oh, and I got a big kick out of the “proselytized” natives. Ha!
- I miss the days when people still hoped and imagined that there might actually be life on Venus. Reading this story is fun because you gain a little bit of that long lost feeling.
- Really the only thing I didn’t like was how Mr. Smith goes a little cuckoo – some of the things described in “Happy Ending” didn’t seem very logical to me. Of course, what is logical about going crazy?
Stats:
- My Rating: 4.0 out of 5
- Page Count: 9
- Word Count: 5,366
- Originally published in the September 1957 edition of Fantastic Universe.
- Reprinted in Fredric Brown’s award winning short story collection From These Ashes: The Complete Short SF of Fredric Brown
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- You can read “Happy Ending” online for free at Project Gutenberg.
Read Some More Great Science Fiction Short Stories!
If you liked this story be sure to check out Superiority by Arthur C. Clarke or The Only Thing We Learn by Cyril Kornbluth – both of which have some similar themes.
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Brown is well regarded by an older generation, but I found him to be inconsistent; his works range from superb (“Star Mouse”) to very good (“Mouse”) to pretty mundane. I’m yet to see anything really good by Reynolds.
“Mouse” is a less creepy version of Campbell’s much filmed “Who Goes There?” Both “Mouse” & Campbell’s original are online – I’ve linked them both in the past.
Thanks Tinkoo,
“Mouse” sounds really cool – I’ve put it on my list of stories to read.
FYI, your “ant” picture is actually that of an ant-mimicking spider. Fascinating creatures, see the link for more info on them.
Ha! Very cool – I didn’t know that, but thanks for the information!