Picnic on Paradise
Joanna Russ
157 pages
published in 1968

Alyx is a Trans-Temporal Agent (or perhaps The Trans-Temporal Agent), literally plucked out of the Mediterranean Sea of four thousand years ago, brought to the winter resort planet of Paradise to guide a group of tourists safely to a pickup point so they can be evacuated from the warzone Paradise has suddenly become. This wasn't supposed to be very difficult, just exhausting having to herd eight very individualist, not very bright tourists on foot from point A to B without mishap, but of course things do not turn out to be that simple (they never do).

I bought this book for an Euro, when the local US import bookstore was still selling cheap secondhand science fiction, mainly out of curiosity. I haven't read very much of Joanna Russ' work, just a few short stories spread thorugh various anthologies. She always seemed to be a bit too stridently feminist to me, but this is probably a misconception caused by inadequate summaries on the back of library books... Certainly Picnic on Paradise isn't feminist science fiction, strident or otherwise, unless you count any book with a strong female protagonist as feminist sf.

In fact, Picnic on Paradise is an old fashioned adventure sf story, with a plot a Keith Laumer or a Lloyd Biggle could've used, but with a far greater focus on the group dynamics between Alyx and her fellow refugees. Which makes this somewhat more interesting then if it had only focused on external conflicts. Each of the characters feels real, is recognisable without being stereotyped, which makes the interplay between them interesting.

The only thing I really regret about this novel is that it's too short; the story is over too soon and seems to lack room to breathe. Especially in the later part things feel rushed.