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SLAN

SLAN

DystopianScience Fiction
Pages
190
Published
1946
Language
English

Synopsis

Slan is A. E. van Vogt's 1946 science fiction classic, first serialized in Astounding Science Fiction in 1940. It follows Jommy Cross, a nine-year-old member of the Slans — a persecuted race of telepathic mutants identifiable by the golden tendrils in their hair. After his mother is killed by a mob in the capital city of Centropolis, Jommy is taken in by an old woman and forced into petty crime, all while carrying a hidden technological inheritance from his slain father.

As Jommy grows older, he is drawn into the schemes of Earth's dictator, Kier Gray, and discovers that Slans are split into two warring factions: the tendrilled Slans, hunted by ordinary humans, and the tendrilless Slans, who secretly control air and space travel and have colonized the outer planets. Jommy's search for the truth takes him as far as Mars, where he must avert a three-way interplanetary war and confront the real nature of Kier Gray's rule.

One of the most influential novels of pulp-era science fiction, Slan won the 1941 Retro-Hugo Award for Best Novel (awarded in 2016) and gave science fiction fandom its enduring in-joke, "fans are slans."

Prose complexity
4/10

Vibe

DarkTenseThought-ProvokingAdventurous
Chosen OneSurvivalQuest

Genres

Dystopian Science Fiction Space Opera

About the author

A
A. E. van Vogt

Alfred Elton van Vogt was born on a farm in Edenburg, a Russian Mennonite community east of Gretna, Manitoba. Early in his career he wrote for true confession pulp magazines like True Story, but in the late 1930s he began writing science fiction, which he was more interested in. His first published SF story, "Black Destroyer" was published in 1939, and is considered to be one of the first works of the Golden Age of science fiction. In 1941 he left his job at the Department of National Defence to...

Characters

Jommy CrossProtagonist
Kier GrayAntagonist
Kathleen LaytonSupporting
All characters in SLAN

Frequently asked questions

  • What is the origin of the phrase fans are slans?

    This mantra emerged within the American science fiction fandom during the 1940s as a way for readers to identify with the persecuted, superior mutants in the novel, effectively turning the book's title into a symbol of fannish elitism.

  • Did this book receive any major awards?

    The novel was honored with a Retro-Hugo Award for Best Novel in 2016, recognizing its significance as a work from 1941.

  • Is there a sequel to this story?

    A follow-up titled Slan Hunter was published in 2007, which incorporates material from an unfinished draft by A. E. van Vogt and was completed by Kevin J. Anderson.