Space doctor strikes again

kw: book reviews, science fiction, space fiction, space aliens, medicine

In the second book in James White's Sector General series, Star Surgeon, the Conway and O'Mara show leads to war (See my earlier post for background information on the series). The 1963 novel begins with the well-established space hospital, Sector 12 General, fully functional, staffed by members of most of the eighty space-faring species of the Federation (I don't suppose the Federation found in the Star Trek universe is based on this one, but it may be).

The novel opens with a new patient, a new problem to be solved: an apparent criminal, who is suspected of killing and eating a companion, his ship's physician. But the patient is unconscious, or at least unresponsive, though an empath reports that somebody is definitely alert. The patient has some kind of skin condition, which eventually provides the clue to what is going on. Attempts to cure the condition, or to remove affected skin, are startlingly unsuccessful. Finding out the real situation is the key to curing this being's condition and determining that, far from having eaten his physician, he has assimilated him: his doctor, a collective being made of virus-sized particles, dwells inside him.

This patient, named Lonvellin, is of a very long-lived species whose members live singly, find planets with major problems, and solve those problems, though they do it with a long-term view to raising the planetary culture another notch or two, and do so very slowly so as not to disrupt things.

Lonvellin bites off more than he can chew. The planet he lands on is xenophobic in the extreme, and he is attacked. The residents are very much like Earth humans, so he asks for help from the Federation, and Conway in particular. Humans are able to make contact without violent repercussions, at first. The xenophobia turns out to be mainly related to imperial politics, and the Emperor, the real cause of the planet's problems, declares war on the Federation and sends a multi-planet space navy to attack Sector General.

The bulk of the novel follows the progress of the war, and of the efforts of Conway and his colleagues to restore casualties of many species to fighting health. His own sympathy for patients leads inadvertently to a diplomatic breakthrough that leads to a cease-fire and eventual end of hostilities. Sometimes, a man who can cry is the best kind.

This sort of very human SciFi story is the reason I became enamored of the genre nearly fifty years ago.