Star Hunter

Andre Norton

★★★☆☆

I’d never read any of Andre Norton’s books before, so when I saw a bunch of them on Standard Ebooks, I figured I’d take a look. The first one I read was Star Hunter, which maybe wasn’t the best place to start. It’s mainly an adventure story, a jungle survival trip with ruthless rivals that could just as easily be set in any wilderness area on Earth.

Of the two main characters, one is the tough guy type who runs safaris on alien worlds, and wants to “find” the lost heir to a fortune who had crashed on the planet some time ago. The other is captured and brainwashed into believing he’s the lost heir, then dropped on the planet ahead of the expedition. Things go wrong, adventure ensues.

But the adventure isn’t really satisfying. Even when weird things start happening because it’s an alien planet, they’re never really addressed as ideas, just as obstacles. And the ending pulls a plot twist out of nowhere to wrap everything up with a bow.

Fortunately, I picked up a few more of her books that I liked better!