Tuesday 28 July 2020

Blood Odors

This has become a prolonged comparison of the Technic and Known Space future history series. I want to borrow Niven's and Lerner's five Worlds novels from Lancaster Public Library but it is closed indefinitely because of the coronavirus. Treatment that my granddaughter was receiving is halted by the virus and, before that, had been interrupted by flooding. We are living in Poul Anderson's Chaos.

In an Ythrian flagship:

"The air blew warm, ruffling their plumes a little, scented with perfume of cinnamon bush and amberdragon. Blood odors would not be ordered unless and until the vessel got into actual combat; the crew would soon be worn out if stimulated too intensely."
-Poul Anderson, The People Of The Wind IN Anderson, Rise Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2011), pp. 437-662 AT VII, p. 518.

In a kzinti Slasher-class armed scout:

"The cooling system was whining audibly as it pumped energy into its central tank of degenerate matter, and still the cabin was furnace dry and hot, full of the wild odors of fear and blood that the habitation-system poured out in combat conditions."
-"The Children's Hour," Chapter II, p. 185.

1 comment:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

I'm sorry coronavirus has interrupted treatment of your grand daughter. I hope this interruption will not endanger her health too much.

If I recall correctly, mention was made in the Technic stories of Imperial warships favoring the ventilation being cool, with perhaps a scent of ozone.

Ad astra! Sean