Lord from planet earth

Princess Worth Death

The young guy Sergei rescues a girl from hooligans, falls in love with her and receives a ring from her as a sign that they are engaged. The girl disappears, but after five years Sergey hears her call from the ring and is transferred to her home planet. Having obtained clothes and a “flat” sword with a blade of atomic thickness, Sergei goes to look for a girl. Sergey learns from a local resident that the girl is the princess of this planet, and he is a contender for the role of prince. Only the winner of the Knight's Tournament of the planet can become a prince, and his current winner Shorray wants to seize power over the planet. Sergey, as the last official contender, can save the empire by becoming the princess’s husband. He agrees to enter the palace and abduct the princess in order to get married in the Temple of the Universe. The use of weapons and equipment is impossible, since the emperor’s palace is protected by a neutralizing field. Sergey learns to wield an atomic sword, and also receives weapons from the mysterious Sower.

Having kidnapped the princess with the help of a glider, at the airport he collides with Shorray. In a duel, Sergey avoids defeat at the last moment, using the weapon of the Sowers, which throws him back to the beginning of the operation. The second time, Sergei manages to get to the Temple, and there Shorray challenges him to a duel. Sergey kills Shorray, using the memory of their last battle. However, he cannot become a prince, because on Earth lies the curse of the Sowers. On every inhabited planet, except for the Earth, there is an indestructible Temple of the Universe erected by the Sowers, with the help of which ships can reach the desired planet, while the real position of the planets is unknown to anyone. Thus, the Earth is a planet that is not. Sergey decides to go in search of his native planet.

A Planet That Not

Sergey has been trying unsuccessfully for more than two years to find the Earth on the Terra spaceship. On one of the planets, he finds the earthly boy Danka from the "White Raider" of the "Descendants of the Sower" sect. He was thrown to force Sergey to move to Earth with the help of a hyper transition. The purpose of the sect is to destroy enemies whom, in their opinion, could not or did not have time to destroy the Sowers. Soon, Sergei realizes that the sect of the “Descendants” is commanded by the missing emperor and empress Tara. A quark bomb on board the Raider can destroy the Earth, but its location can still be calculated. Terra fights the Raider, but loses.

Sergey understands that he is a Sower, and he learns from the Architect of Lighthouses that the Sowers are earthlings from the XXII century, abandoned the seeds of life in the past and built Temples. To stop the sectarians, Sergey convinces the Architect that the Earth will not be destroyed precisely because of his intervention. He calls to earth his wife Terry. The emperor and empress can not allow the death of his daughter, so they do not detonate the bomb. Sergey and Terry decide to move into the present of the Sowers, on April 11, 2133, on the eve of the war with the Fangs. Danka is returned to Earth.

Glass Sea

Sergey and Terry live in their residence on the lifeless planet Somat. The rivers and lakes of the planet are filled with "dry water": particles of water are surrounded by " organosilicon " - a complex compound, due to which water turns into dust. But under the influence of a liquid, “dry water” becomes normal. Unknown robots attack the house of Sergey, after which he decides to fly to Earth and enter the war with the fangs. Planet Tar was in a strategically very important area for the Earth. Some time later, Sergei learns that some “Alienated” unleashed the war - super creatures, descendants of earthlings and fangs. War for the fangs has become the new meaning of life, they are completely delighted with it. Sergey contacts the Detached and stops the war, proving to the fans that the world is much more beautiful than war. In the battle on Somat, Sergey defeated one of the fangs, and the mixture of their blood becomes a kind of catalyst for the transition of "dry water" to a normal liquid state, leading to a revival of life on the planet.

According to Sergei Lukyanenko, at the time of the creation of the trilogy, “there was a persistent and false belief that the“ space opera ”was obviously primitive, sketchy reading”. Therefore, the novel "The Lord from the Planet Earth" "was written in discussion with this point of view" ^[1] .

The name of the “fang” race from the story “Glass Sea”, which can be translated from English as “fang” ( English “fang” ), was actually constructed phonetically, without reference to languages ^[2] . The “dry water” described in the story “Glass Sea”, whose molecules are coated with a special organosilicon compound, was invented by the writer on the basis of material from popular science literature describing such a technology. The author himself noted that he followed the path of Jules Verne, using in the novel previously unnoticed interesting technology ^[2] .

In 1994, two trilogy novels were first published in Alma-Ata : “The Princess is Worth Death” and “A Planet That Doesn’t”. Sergey Lukyanenko’s collection published also included several stories by the writer ^[3] . The complete trilogy novel ^{[2] [4]} was published in 1996 in Minsk by the Literature Publishing House. The cover illustration was made by Louis Royo , and the internal illustrations by Cyril Garin ^[5] . Later, the novel was translated into Czech and Polish ^[6] .

According to Boris Nevsky, Sergei Lukyanenko’s trilogy “Lord from the Planet Earth” can be considered the beginning of the century of Russian space opera , which continues to this day ^[1] . Based on the "classic cosmo opera patterns", the novel nonetheless significantly differed from the "simple adventures" of the founders of the space opera genre in science fiction - Edmond Hamilton and Edward Smith ^[1] . Yielding to the artistic merits of many authors of the Soviet era, Lukyanenko is distinguished by the fact that he consciously wrote to the cosmo-opera, not trying to call his novel science fiction ^[1] . Nevertheless, "the book is written in good Russian, clearly and expressively, which is almost not typical of mass fiction" ^[24] . According to Boris Nevsky, "Sergey Lukyanenko’s trilogy became a brook that broke through the dam." Following his novel, many other cosmo-opera works written in Russian appeared on book shelves ^[1] .

Lukyanenko actively reduces the "pathos required by the genre", using non-standard moves in the novel to solve canonical genre problems ^[25] . The introduction of purely entertaining literature, which originally belonged to the cosmo-opera genre, of some idea was, according to critics, innovative at that time. Yaroslav Khoroshkov noted the issues of tolerance, applied humanism and responsibility ^[25] . According to Vasily Vladimirovsky , the story “Glass Sea” turns the trilogy novel “into the likeness of a complex multidimensional labyrinth”, touching upon various problems that, at first glance, are located away from the main storyline. It is in the third part that the author’s intention ^[4] is developing. The literary critic notes the “multidimensional stratification of unorthodox sociological and theological concepts” on which the work is based, and compares the entire trilogy with a three-step glass staircase, along which the reader follows the author - “from the uncomplicated daring of the Princess ...”, through the straightforwardness of the plot of the “Planet” , which is not “- to the depth and complexity of the“ Glass Sea “, completing and looping the entire trilogy of the part” ^[4] . The romantic attitude to the need for violence is replaced by the end of the novel with the indictment of the War in any of its manifestations ^[4] .

One of the leading Soviet critics of science fiction, Vsevolod Revich, expressed more restraint about the possibility of delivering an important idea with the help of such an entertaining genre as a cosmoopera. In his opinion, the false beauty of war is capable of “bewitching the reader”, which is what the authors of “thoroughly soaked in blood of earthly and cosmic operas” use ^[26] . The critic notes the uniformity of plot schemes and the main character in such works, which Lukyanenko did not escape. Understanding the causes of the war with the fangs described in the novel, Revich notes that it is caused by a misunderstanding and is “a meaningless tragic mistake” ^[26] . Drawing parallels with the real state of affairs and many wars for void reasons, the critic notes that the novel could be called philosophical. Nevertheless, in his opinion, the philosophical principle was pushed “so far that another reader may not notice it”, and “the combination of serious thoughts with the techniques of tabloid literature is an impossible thing in principle” ^[26] .

The protagonist of the novel, a young guy Sergei, even before being transferred to another world, on Earth “was distinguished by his intelligence, quick wits, strong muscles and, in general, good physical preparation” ^[25] . According to him, all his life he was a soldier. At first he fought in hot spots, then participated in the division of the city by various groups ^[24] . In the new conditions, the character is forced to adapt, develop and improvise, because of which he "looks like a much bigger burdock" ^[25] . In the world of Temples, Sergey again has to fight: first with Shorray on plane swords, then with a pirate ship of the sect of the Descendants of the Sowers. After the transfer to the future, the war does not leave a character forced to take part in the conflict between earthlings and fangs. "Tired of endless wars," Sergei ends the war of people and fangs, which otherwise could lead to the death of both civilizations ^[24] . In addition, Yaroslav Khoroshkov notes romance, irony, the ability to be insecure and hesitate when making decisions, as well as scrupulousness in choosing means. At the same time, in a critical situation, Sergey is able to act firmly, and “those who dare to stand in his way become corpses” ^[25] . The heroic irony is manifested in his assessment of his position and that fact. that he got into a space opera ^[25] . According to Vasily Vladimirovsky, the protagonist "gradually grew smarter and more complicated" during the trilogy, along with an increase in the writer's skill. From "a boyishly romantic idea of ​​the need for violence" for the good ... "" Sergei goes on to negatively assess it as something unnatural ^[4] .

The literary critic Vitaly Kaplan notes the presence of krapivinsky motifs in the novel ^[27] . If the first part is mainly heroic fantasy, then in the second there is a friendship between an adult and a child - Krapivin's “pillar direction”. After meeting with Danka, Sergey will have to make a difficult choice between rational perception of the boy as an obstacle and even a threat on the one hand and trust and friendship on the other. The very fact of friendship becomes for Sergey “the highest value” ^[27] . In addition, the novel contains reminiscences from various works of science fiction writers, in particular Krapivin and the Strugatsky brothers . The appearance of the 12-year-old Danka at the spacecraft resembles Krapivin’s novel “Dovecote on the Yellow Glade”. The super civilization of the Sowers is a reference to the Wanderers, which appear in many of the Strugatsky novels. The description of the Earth of the XXII century is inspired by the classic “ Noon world ” ^[24] .

In 1996, the novella “The Planet That Is Not” was nominated for the Interpresscon and Bronze Snail prizes in the Big Form nomination ^{[28] [29]} . In 1997, the novel “Glass Sea” ^{[28] [29] was} nominated for the same prizes.

Audiobook

In 2008, the Audiobook publishing house, part of the AST Publishing Group holding, recorded an audiobook based on the trilogy novel Lord from the Planet Earth. The audiobook came out on two CDs. Cover artwork by Louis Royo ^[30] .

Screen version

In 2006, work began on a script for the film adaptation of the whole novel. Lukyanenko participated as a consultant ^[31] . By the end of 2007, the script of the trilogy was written. Filming was planned to begin in 2008 ^[32] .

Game

In 2007, based on the novel, Mobile Infocom created a multi-user online space strategy for cell phones - Lords ^{[33] [34]} . Players can seize military resources and enemy territories, unite in alliances and invade alien planets. According to the legend of the game, the lords who came from nowhere could not agree on the structure of the world. The first of the Lords “proclaimed order”, having built an ideal state from its point of view, the rest settled on distant planets, the borders of which touched over time ^[33] . Now the cosmos is divided into two parts, in one of which is order, and in the other is independence. The player chooses a side and takes part in the battles ^{[33] [34]} .

• “The princess is worth the death” (neopr.) . Official site of Sergey Lukyanenko.
• "A planet that does not exist" (neopr.) . Official site of Sergey Lukyanenko.
• "Glass Sea" (neopr.) . Official site of Sergey Lukyanenko.
• Sergey Lukyanenko “Lord from the Planet Earth” (neopr.) . Science Fiction Laboratory .
• Sergey Pereslegin. Armor for wandering souls (Rus.) // Two hundred: magazine. - 1995. - No. D. (inaccessible link)