Charbonneau, Louis
Entry updated 9 January 2023. Tagged: Author.
(1924-2017) US journalist and author who also wrote nonfantastic Westerns as by Carter Travis Young; after writing some radio plays at the end of the 1940s, he worked as a journalist for the Los Angeles Times (1952-1971), beginning to publish sf novels with No Place on Earth (1958), about a coercive Dystopia. He produced sf for several years thereafter, publishing: Corpus Earthling (1960), about invading telepathic Martian parasites (see Mars) who eventually pass on their ESP powers to mankind; The Sentinel Stars (1963), another dystopia, this time about doomed revolts in a regimented future; Psychedelic-40 (1965; vt The Specials 1965); and Antic Earth (1967; vt Down to Earth 1967), set in one of a series of Space Stations designed for emergency landings, though the small crew of Station #17 lives in an environment designed to simulate conditions back on Earth – which it turns out has been rendered unlivable by an atomic explosion.
In all these novels Charbonneau tends towards claustrophobic situations in which his rather conventional protagonists explore themselves through action scenarios. Also in the 1960s, he scripted two episodes of The Outer Limits (1963-1965). After 1980 much of his work was Horror; he became inactive after the late 1990s. Charbonneau should not be confused with Louis Charbonneau (? - ), a Canadian educator. [JC]
Louis Henry Charbonneau
born Detroit, Michigan: 20 January 1924
died Lomita, California: 11 May 2017
works
- No Place on Earth (Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Company, 1958) [hb/Joe Mugnaini]
- Corpus Earthling (Rockville Centre, New York: Zenith Books, 1960) [pb/]
- The Sentinel Stars: A Novel of the Future (New York: Bantam Books, 1963) [pb/]
- Psychedelic-40 (New York: Bantam Books, 1965) [pb/Paul Lehr]
- The Specials (London: Herbert Jenkins, 1965) [vt of the above: hb/]
- Antic Earth (London: Herbert Jenkins, 1967) [hb/uncredited]
- Down to Earth (New York: Bantam Books, 1967) [vt of the above: pb/Paul Lehr]
- The Sensitives (New York: Bantam Books, 1963) [tie: from a filmscript by Deane Romano: pb/]
- Barrier World (New York: Lancer Books, 1970) [pb/Steele Savage]
- Embryo (New York: Warner Books, 1976) [tie: Embryo: pb/]
- Intruder (Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Company, 1979) [marginal sf about Computer crime: hb/Bill Maughan]
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