''A Specter is Haunting Texas'' is a

science fiction Science fiction (often shortened to sci-fi or abbreviated SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts. These concepts may include information technology and robotics, biological manipulations, space ...

novel by American writer

Fritz Leiber Fritz Reuter Leiber Jr. ( ; December 24, 1910 – September 5, 1992) was an American writer of fantasy, horror, and science fiction. Along with Robert E. Howard and Michael Moorcock, Leiber is one of the fathers of sword and sorcery. Life ...

, first published as a novel in 1969. It was originally published as a three-part serial in the magazine ''

Galaxy Science Fiction ''Galaxy Science Fiction'' was an American digest-size science fiction magazine, published in Boston from 1950 to 1980. It was founded by a French-Italian company, World Editions, which was looking to break into the American market. World Edi ...

'' in 1968. The title appears to be based on a

Karl Marx Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...

quote from ''

The Communist Manifesto ''The Communist Manifesto'' (), originally the ''Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (), is a political pamphlet written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, commissioned by the Communist League and originally published in London in 1848. The ...

'': "A spectre is haunting Europe...the spectre of communism."

Plot summary

Scully Christopher Crockett La Cruz is an actor, fortune seeker and adventurer from the long isolated orbital

technocratic Technocracy is a form of government in which decision-makers appoint knowledge experts in specific domains to provide them with advice and guidance in various areas of their policy-making responsibilities. Technocracy follows largely in the tra ...

democracies Democracy (from , ''dēmos'' 'people' and ''kratos'' 'rule') is a form of government in which political power is vested in the people or the population of a state. Under a minimalist definition of democracy, rulers are elected through competitiv ...

of Circumluna and the Bubbles Congeries. He lands in what he believes to be

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

to reclaim family mining interests only to discover that Canada is now North Texas and what is left of

civilization A civilization (also spelled civilisation in British English) is any complex society characterized by the development of state (polity), the state, social stratification, urban area, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyon ...

in North America is ruled by primitive, backslapping, bigger than life anti-intellectual "good ole boys" convinced of their own

moral A moral (from Latin ''morālis'') is a message that is conveyed or a lesson to be learned from a story or event. The moral may be left to the hearer, reader, or viewer to determine for themselves, or may be explicitly encapsulated in a maxim. ...

superiority. In the tortured version of history known to the giant hormone-boosted

Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons, in some contexts simply called Saxons or the English, were a Cultural identity, cultural group who spoke Old English and inhabited much of what is now England and south-eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. They traced t ...

inhabitants who rule a diminutive

Mexican Mexican may refer to: Mexico and its culture *Being related to, from, or connected to the country of Mexico, in North America ** People *** Mexicans, inhabitants of the country Mexico and their descendants *** Mexica, ancient indigenous people ...

underclass, the original Texas, or ''Texas'', had actually secretly ruled the pre-nuclear war United States since 1845. Texas escaped the nuclear destruction of the rest of the United States because of the foresight of Lyndon the First. An enormous

bunker A bunker is a defensive military fortification designed to protect people and valued materials from falling bombs, artillery, or other attacks. Bunkers are almost always underground, in contrast to blockhouses which are mostly above ground. T ...

then known as the

Houston Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...

Carlsbad Caverns Carlsbad Caverns National Park is a national park of the United States in the Guadalupe Mountains of southeastern New Mexico. The primary attraction of the park is the show cave Carlsbad Cavern. Visitors can hike in on their own via the natural ...

Denver Denver ( ) is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Consolidated city and county, consolidated city and county, the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Colorado, most populous city of the U.S. state of ...

Kansas City The Kansas City metropolitan area is a bi-state metropolitan area anchored by Kansas City, Missouri. Its 14 counties straddle the border between the U.S. states of Missouri (9 counties) and Kansas (5 counties). With and a population of more t ...

Little Rock Little Rock is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Arkansas, most populous city of the U.S. state of Arkansas. The city's population was 202,591 as of the 2020 census. The six-county Central Arkan ...

Pentagram A pentagram (sometimes known as a pentalpha, pentangle, or star pentagon) is a regular five-pointed star polygon, formed from the diagonal line segments of a convex (or simple, or non-self-intersecting) regular pentagon. Drawing a circle around ...

and now referred to simply as the Texas Bunker had saved the heartland during a war that destroyed both American coasts, Europe, Russia, China, and Africa. Texas then conquered the rest of the

continent A continent is any of several large geographical regions. Continents are generally identified by convention (norm), convention rather than any strict criteria. A continent could be a single large landmass, a part of a very large landmass, as ...

, although Hawaii and Cuba remain stubbornly "unconquered".

Reception

Alexei Panshin Alexei Panshin (August 14, 1940 – August 21, 2022) was an American writer and science fiction critic. He wrote several critical works and several novels, including the 1968 Nebula Award–winning novel ''Rite of Passage (Panshin), Rite of Pas ...

described ''Specter'' as "an intermittently satirical melodrama about revolution," saying "Its greatest strength, in fact, is in conceits and occasional lines. And two-thirds of the way through it falls apart, its satire forgotten in favor of the melodramatic requirement of movement at any cost."

Ron Goulart Ronald Joseph Goulart (; January 13, 1933 – January 14, 2022) was an American popular culture historian and mystery, fantasy and science fiction author. He worked on novels and novelizations (and other works) being published under various ps ...

called the novel "a big, funny and angry book. . . . a fine non-stop picaresque about a future United States that's turned into Texas and about race, love, violence, God, death, Shakespeare, and most anything else you can name.""Books", ''

Venture Science Fiction ''Venture Science Fiction'' was an American digest-size science fiction magazine, first published from 1957 to 1958, and revived for a brief run in 1969 and 1970. Ten issues were published of the 1950s version, with another six in the second r ...

'', November 1969, p. 106

References

Release details

*Fritz Leiber. 1968, 1969, 1971. ''A Specter is Haunting Texas''. ''Galaxy Science Fiction'', Walker, Bantam.

External links

* * * ''A Specter is Haunting Texas'' as serialized in ''Galaxy Science Fiction''
parts onetwo
an
three
at the

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...

1969 American novels 1969 science fiction novels Dystopian novels American science fiction novels Novels by Fritz Leiber Novels set in Texas Works originally published in Galaxy Science Fiction Novels first published in serial form {{1960s-novel-stub