Matthew Looney and the
Invasion of Earth, by Jerome Beatty Jr. Illustrations by Gahan
Wilson. (Avon/Camelot 1965; this 4th Printing 1972)
“The
Moon People realize there is life on Earth because the Earth has bombed
the Moon! The expeditionary force sent to invade Earth is successful this time
in finding living creatures. Terrified by what they interpret as water bullets
hurled at them from the sky, the spacemen flee in such haste that they leave
Matthew behind. So, to Matthew alone belongs the glory of finally meeting the
EARTH people and bringing a dangerous specimen back to the Moon.” – from the
back of the book. ‘Matthew Looney combines the ingenuity of Buck Rogers with
the charm of Charlie Brown.’ – The New York Times.
A piece of space junk (a probe?) crashes on
the Moon just as Matthew Looney, now a Spaceman First Class, is prepared for a
second journey to Earth with his space-hero Uncle Lucky. They are to be joined
by Hector Hornblower, Matthew’s frenemy and rival, who will be Cabin Boy this
time. Not exactly evil, but he's proud and envious, sort of the Eddie Haskell of
outer space. The sudden ‘attack’ on the Moon indicates that there is far
more advanced life on Earth than they knew.
This changes their mission: it
becomes first, to make contact and secure a peace treaty and second, failing
that, to use powerful ‘Lava-Four’ bombs to destroy the Earth. The ship is
refitted for the new mission.
They
have traced the trajectory of the ‘bomb’ to Florida, so they head there
accordingly. This place is unfortunately surrounded and soaked with the theoretically
deadly substance ‘water’. They land, and when Matthew and his Uncle separate to
do some scouting, they encounter flamingos and alligators, which are taken to
be possible Earthlings. A sudden rain is interpreted as an attack, and in the commotion
to return to the ship and escape, Matthew (partly through the malice of Hector)
is left behind. There is not enough fuel to land and take off again, so Uncle
Lucky and crew are reluctantly forced to return to the Moon and leave Matthew stranded.
Things
look pretty bad when Matthew is captured by Wiley Kalmuck, a grumpy security official
at Cape Canaveral, who locks him up as a childish prankster on government
property. But Dr. Leonard O. Davinchy is soon convinced of his story when
Matthew demonstrates some of his high tech, melting his prison door with a ray
gun and using his anti-gravity device to float up to the ceiling.
It
is decided that, with the help of this device, they will secretly speed up
their own proposed launch to the Moon and return Matthew home. Matthew only
agrees after the government has signed a non-aggression pact with the Moon. He,
Kalmuck, and Davinchy blast off.
Once
there, however, Kalmuck reveals that the treaty has been secretly altered and
is not worth the paper it is written on. The Earth ship is equipped with a
nuclear warhead which he threatens to use if the Moon does not surrender. But,
not being used to the lighter gravity, he accidentally launches himself upward,
and is soon subdued.
Davinchy,
being a much more peaceable man (how old is this trope of the gung-ho war hawk as
opposed to the reasonable scientist?) agrees to return to the Earth to procure
a proper treaty with all the nations of the Earth, as opposed to being
Lava-Four bombed into oblivion.
To
Matthew’s delight, as it is a three-man rocket, Hector is shanghaied into being
the third ‘man’ and is soon winging his way unwillingly back to Earth. And here
the book ends.
Well,
that settles that point: I have no memory of this volume, so Journey is
the only Matthew Looney book I ever read. This copy of Invasion is much
smaller than the reprint of Journey and is in pretty good shape for a 52-year-old
paperback kid’s book. I am enjoying this trip to an Alternate Childhood, and
can hardly wait to get the next in the series, Matthew Looney in the Outback
(put a shrimp on the barbie!); after that I can finally read Matthew Looney
and the Space Pirates (‘you know, pirates … but in space!’) which I’ve had
for years.
