L. Neil Smith

L. Neil Smith has twice won the Prometheus Award, given by the Libertarian Futurist Society for outstanding science fiction with libertarian themes. His Prometheus Award-winning novels were The Probability Broach (1982) and Pallas (1994).

The Probability Broach was his first novel. It pictures a parallel libertarian earth, and wonderfully combines humor, action, suspense and libertarian ideology. The libertarian society in the book, and some of its characters, are further explored in sequels.

Smith has written around twenty science fiction novels, many explicitly libertarian. He served on the Platform Committee of the Libertarian Party in the mid-70's, and in 1978 ran for state legislator as a Libertarian Party candidate, gaining 15% of the vote with a total expenditure of $44.00.

L. Neil Smith is also an outspoken gun rights activist. He is founder and International Coordinator of the Libertarian Second Amendment Caucus, and is an NRA Life Member.

Following is a list of some of his novels, along with brief summaries.

The Novels of L. Neil Smith

Pallas (Tor Books, 1993)

In the persons of Gibson Altman, an exiled liberal United States Senator, and Emerson Ngu,a young Vietnamese/Cambodian immigrant boy who aspires to manufacture firearms, socialist "East America" and entrepreneurs of the West American "Jackelope Republic" fight for control of a whole new world, the second-largest of the asteroids. Lots of action, romance, RKBA polemics, plus metallic silhouette shooting!

Winner of the 1994 Prometheus Award.

Forge of The Elders: Contact and Commune (Warner Books, 1990)

Forge of The Elders: Converse and Conflict (Warner Books, 1990)

Forge of The Elders: Concert and Cosmos (* see note below)

The American Soviet Socialist Republic claims the asteroid 5023 Eris, but somebody (or something) is already there! The Elders are from Earth ... sort of. They aren't human, but they are capitalists!

(* So politically incorrect that Warner Books unilaterally cancelled the third volume!)

Henry Martyn (Tor Books, 1989)

A thousand years from now, in the depths of interstellar space, there will be sailing ships and pirates! Vast empires clash as young Arran Islay fights for freedom and to regain a legacy brutally stripped from his family by the "Black Usurper".

The sequel is Bretta Martyn (1996).

The Wardove (Berkley/Ace, 1986)

Earth was destroyed in 2023 and only Lunar colonists survived. Nine hundred years later, in a star-spanning "nation" without conscription or taxation, Captain Nathaniel Blackburn of Coordinated Arm Intelligence must find out who's killing rock musicians raising money for the War Against the Clusterian Powers. Includes lyrics to a dozen songs written by the author.

The Crystal Empire (Tor Books, 1986)

Moslems rule the world in this adventure of an inventor and gunsmith in an alternate universe where the Black Plague killed 999 out of 1000 and technology, especially firearms, took the blame.

Lando Calrissian & The Mindhard of Sharu (Del Rey Books, 1983)

Lando Calrissian & The Flamewind of Oseon (Del Rey Books, 1983)

Lando Calrissian & The Starcave of Thonboka (Del Rey Books, 1983)

Youthful adventures of Star Wars' famous gambler before Han Solo won the Millenium Falcon from him. Re-released in omnibus edition titled The Lando Calrissian Adventures, Summer, 1994.

Taflak Lysandra (Avon, 1988)

In the first of six projected sequels to Brightsuit MacBear, testing a marvelous "subfoline" craft, young Elsie Nahuatl (last seen in Tom Paine Maru) becomes lost amidst the bizarre collectivist cultures which lurk beneath the planet Majesty's "Sea of Leaves" with her father-a cybernetically-enhanced coyote.

Brightsuit MacBear (Avon, 1988)

On Majesty, a planet covered from pole-to-pole with jungle six miles deep, Win Bear's great grandson MacDougall battles to prevent a terrible crime and recover a lost inheritance.

The Gallatin Divergence (Del Rey Books, 1985)

Win Bear travels back in time to 1794 to save Albert Gallatin, founder of the North American Confederacy, from assassins. First appearance in print of the author's "Covenant of Unanimous Consent".

Tom Paine Maru (Del Rey Books, 1984)

The North American Confederacy reaches the stars at last, its Prime Directive: search out governments wherever they are found to exist and destroy them!

Their Majesties' Bucketeers (Del Rey Books, 1981)

On an alien world whose furry, nine-legged crablike inhabitiants are just entering their own "Age of Invention", a royal "fireman" must create the art of criminal detection from scratch, in order to solve the murder of his favorite teacher.

The Venus Belt (Del Rey Books, 1980)

How does a totally ethical culture conquer its own "final frontier"? A mysterious series of disappearances leads gumshoe Win Bear, assisted by Koko Featherstone-Haugh (a young female gorilla) and Lucy Kropotkin (a disgruntled murder victim temporarily housed in a robot body) to the asteroids, a super-villain with an all-too-familiar face, and a conspiracy stretching across whole universes.

The Nagasaki Vector (Del Rey Books, 1983)

Is a culture with an absolute regard for individual rights really helpless against those who would destroy it? Professional time traveler Bernie Gruenblum hires Win Bear to track down the stolen flying saucer ... who loves him.

(Based on the short stories "Grimm's Law", "Folger's Factor", and "Grandfather Clause" which appeared in Stellar Science Fiction Stories #s 5, 6, & 7, Del Rey Books, 1980 & 1981. See also "The Embarrassment Box" in New Libertarian #187.)

The Probability Broach (Del Rey Books, 1980)

The book that started it all. In a deadly conflict with murderous federal agents, Denver homicide detective Win Bear is accidentally blown "sideways" in time, into the "North American Confederacy", where the Whiskey Rebellion succeeded in 1794 and government has grown less powerful ever since.

Prometheus Award winner, to be republished by Tor Books in 1996.

(See also "The Spirit of Exmas Sideways", Alternatives, edited by Robert and Pamela Crippen Adams, Baen Books, 1989. Trying to make a place for himself in the stateless North American Confederacy, Win Bear discovers the many joys and difficulties of absolute self-ownership.)