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Keith Laumer

Born

in The United States

June 09, 1925

Died

January 23, 1993

Website

http://www.keithlaumer.com/

Genre

Science Fiction, Fantasy

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John Keith Laumer was an American science fiction author. Prior to becoming a full-time writer, he was an officer in the U.S. Air Force and a U.S. diplomat. His brother March Laumer was also a writer, known for his adult reinterpretations of the Land of Oz (also mentioned in Keith's The Other Side of Time).

Keith Laumer (aka J.K Laumer, J. Keith Laumer) is best known for his Bolo stories and his satirical Retief series. The former chronicles the evolution of juggernaut-sized tanks that eventually become self-aware through the constant improvement resulting from centuries of intermittent warfare against various alien races. The latter deals with the adventures of a cynical spacefaring diplomat who constantly has to overcome the red-tape-infus John Keith Laumer was an American science fiction author. Prior to becoming a full-time writer, he was an officer in the U.S. Air Force and a U.S. diplomat. His brother March Laumer was also a writer, known for his adult reinterpretations of the Land of Oz (also mentioned in Keith's The Other Side of Time).

Keith Laumer (aka J.K Laumer, J. Keith Laumer) is best known for his Bolo stories and his satirical Retief series. The former chronicles the evolution of juggernaut-sized tanks that eventually become self-aware through the constant improvement resulting from centuries of intermittent warfare against various alien races. The latter deals with the adventures of a cynical spacefaring diplomat who constantly has to overcome the red-tape-infused failures of people with names like Ambassador Grossblunder. The Retief stories were greatly influenced by Laumer's earlier career in the United States Foreign Service. In an interview with Paul Walker of Luna Monthly, Laumer states "I had no shortage of iniquitous memories of the Foreign Service."

Four of his shorter works received Hugo or Nebula Award nominations (one of them, "In the Queue", received nominations for both) and his novel A Plague of Demons was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1966.

During the peak years of 1959–1971, Laumer was a prolific science fiction writer, with his novels tending to follow one of two patterns: fast-paced, straight adventures in time and space, with an emphasis on lone-wolf, latent superman protagonists, self-sacrifice and transcendence or, broad comedies, sometimes of the over-the-top variety.

In 1971, Laumer suffered a stroke while working on the novel The Ultimax Man. As a result, he was unable to write for a few years. As he explained in an interview with Charles Platt published in The Dream Makers (1987), he refused to accept the doctors' diagnosis. He came up with an alternative explanation and developed an alternative (and very painful) treatment program. Although he was unable to write in the early 1970s, he had a number of books which were in the pipeline at the time of the stroke published during that time.

In the mid-1970s, Laumer partially recovered from the stroke and resumed writing. However, the quality of his work suffered and his career declined (Piers Anthony, How Precious Was That While, 2002). In later years Laumer also reused scenarios and characters from his earlier works to create "new" books, which some critics felt was to their detriment:

Alas, Retief to the Rescue doesn't seem so much like a new Retief novel, but a kind of Cuisnart mélange of past books.

-- Somtow Sucharitkul (Washington Post, Mar 27, 1983. p. BW11)

His Bolo creations were popular enough that other authors have written standalone science-fiction novels about them.

Laumer was also a model airplane enthusiast, and published two dozen designs between 1956 and 1962 in the U.S. magazines Air Trails, Model Airplane News and Flying Models, as well as the British magazine Aero Modeler. He published one book on the subject, How to Design and Build Flying Models in 1960. His later designs were mostly gas-powered free flight planes, and had a whimsical charm with names to match, like the "Twin Lizzie" and the "Lulla-Bi". His designs are still being revisited, reinvented and built today.
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Combine Editions
Keith Laumer’s books

Average rating: 3.93 · 35,841 ratings · 2,033 reviews · 509 distinct works • Similar authors

	Bolo (Bolo #1) 4.12 avg rating — 3,933 ratings — published 1976 — 14 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Retief! (Retief #1-3+novella) by Keith Laumer, Eric Flint (Compiler) 3.99 avg rating — 2,255 ratings — published 2001 — 6 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Honor of the Regiment: Bolos 1 (Bolo, #4) by Keith Laumer (Creator), Bill Fawcett (Editor), S.M. Stirling (Contributor) 4.11 avg rating — 1,355 ratings — published 1993 — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Retief: Envoy to New Worlds (Retief, #1) 3.98 avg rating — 1,267 ratings — published 1963 — 19 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Triumphant (Bolos 3) by Keith Laumer (Creator), Linda Evans, David Weber 4.20 avg rating — 981 ratings — published 1995 — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Keith Laumer: The Lighter Side by Keith Laumer, Eric Flint (Editor) 3.73 avg rating — 992 ratings — published 2002 — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Unconquerable: Bolos 2 by Keith Laumer, Bill Fawcett (Editor) 4.18 avg rating — 760 ratings — published 1994 — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Last Stand: Bolos 4 by Keith Laumer (Creator), Bill Fawcett (Editor), S.M. Stirling 4.20 avg rating — 685 ratings — published 1997 — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Retief's War (Retief, #3) 3.94 avg rating — 515 ratings — published 1965 — 23 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Compleat Bolo 4.05 avg rating — 489 ratings — published 1990 — 7 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

More books by Keith Laumer…

Series by Keith Laumer

Bolo (17 books)
by

Keith Laumer (Creator),

Bill Fawcett (Editor),

S.M. Stirling,

David Weber,

John Mina,

William R. Forstchen,

Robert Greenberger (Goodreads Author),

William H. Keith Jr.,

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4.10 avg rating — 18,059 ratings

Retief (16 books)
by

Keith Laumer

3.93 avg rating — 7,653 ratings

Bolos (6 books)
by

Keith Laumer (Creator),

J. Steven York (Goodreads Author)

4.18 avg rating — 4,840 ratings

Imperium (4 books)
by

Keith Laumer

3.63 avg rating — 898 ratings

Lafayette O'Leary (4 books)
by

Keith Laumer

3.47 avg rating — 618 ratings

More series by Keith Laumer…

Quotes by Keith Laumer (?)

“It's a time-honored truism of diplomacy that the most resented epithet is the one most accurately depicting the deficiencies of the recipient.”
― keith laumer

tags: diplomacy, humor

7 likes

“I'm not sure that pasteurized thinking is rich enough in intellectual vitamins”
― Keith Laumer, Retief!

6 likes

“Earlyworm rolled the words along the table like a fragmentation grenade.”
― Keith Laumer, Retief: Emissary To The Stars

3 likes

See all Keith Laumer's quotes »

Polls

Book of the Month for Jan2021 - New Wave (1960-1979)

Babel-17 by Samuel R. Delany

13 votes, 43.3%

Venus Plus X by Theodore Sturgeon

8 votes, 26.7%

The Cloud Walker by Edmund Cooper

3 votes, 10.0%

Moderan by David R. Bunch

2 votes, 6.7%

Bolo by Keith Laumer

2 votes, 6.7%

This Perfect Day by Ira Levin

2 votes, 6.7%

30 total votes

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Goodreads Librari...: Please delete this book! (pt. 9)	979	1631	Aug 18, 2011 06:12PM
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Keith Laumer’s Followers (231)

Keith Laumer

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