''. '' '' Chandler's descriptions of life aboard spaceships and the relationships between members of the crew
en route derive from his experience aboard seagoing ships, imparting a distinct sense of realism. He was most well known for his
Rim World series and
John Grimes novels, both of which have a distinctly naval flavour. In the latter, Chandler's principal hero, John Grimes, is an enthusiastic sailor who has occasional adventures on the oceans of various planets. The books make repeated reference to an obsolete type of magnetically powered spaceship known as the "
Gaussjammer", remembered nostalgically by "old timers" – clearly modelled on the
windjammer. The heyday of the Gaussjammer, some centuries earlier than the Rim Worlds books, is the setting of the less well-known
The Deep Reaches of Space (1964) which has undisguised autobiographical elements: its protagonist is a sailor turned science-fiction writer who travels to the future and uses his nautical experience to save a party of humans stranded on an alien planet. Chandler arrived at the John Grimes series in a rather roundabout way. His original Rim Worlds protagonist was merchant spaceman Derek Calver, who drifted from the galactic centre to the Rim (as Chandler himself had migrated from the U.K. to Australia). In
The Rim of Space and
The Ship from Outside, Calver's adventures around the Rim included becoming a ship's captain and meeting and marrying Jane "Calamity" Arlen – like him, a refugee from the galactic centre. Then appeared Sonia Verril, a
femme fatale who tempted Calver, nearly ruining his marriage. With this incipient
love triangle moving towards a confrontation in deep space, the grumpy John Grimes was introduced as a secondary character very much in the background. Eventually, however, Calver and his wife, Arlen, board the Outsiders' ship and depart from the galaxy and out of all human ken, leaving the stage empty for Verril and Grimes to join in an adventure
Into the Alternate Universe, culminating in their marriage, with Grimes thenceforth becoming Chandler's primary character. Chandler provided Grimes with numerous new adventures, as well as charting his career backwards to its humble beginnings, much in the same way as
C. S. Forester's fictional naval hero
Horatio Hornblower, who in some ways served as a model for the John Grimes character, was first introduced as a captain before his career was sketched backwards to his time as a midshipman. Chandler made heavy use of the
parallel universe plot device throughout his career, with many Grimes stories involving characters briefly crossing over into other realities. In "The Dark Dimensions", which is set at a point in space where various realities meet, Grimes (the Rim World commodore), meets a second John Grimes who is still in the Federation Survey Service, as well as characters from the Empress Irene books and
Poul Anderson's
Dominic Flandry. In his
ironic short story "The Cage", a band of shipwrecked humans wandering naked in the jungles of a faraway planet are captured by aliens and placed in a zoo, where, failing in all their efforts to convince their captors that they are intelligent, some are dissected. Eventually they become resigned to captivity and adopt a small local rodent as a pet, placing him in a wicker cage. Seeing this, their captors apologise for the mistake and repatriate them to Earth, remarking that "only intelligent creatures put other creatures in cages". Sex is frequent in Chandler's books, often in
free fall. Women on board are usually stereotyped in roles of
pursers or passengers; seldom are they regular officers in the chain of command. Chandler's protagonists are quite prone to affairs and promiscuous behaviour, but are also shown falling in love and undertaking long-lasting, harmonious marriages; e.g., Sonia Verril served as an officer before marrying Grimes. Relationships are invariably described from the male point of view; whilst women characters might be sympathetic, they are always seen from the outside. In the early
Bring Back Yesterday (1961), the dashing Johnnie Petersen is involved with four women in the course of a single book, whose plot lasts no more than a few weeks. Of them, one is inconsiderate and hurts him deeply; one is kindly and motherly, but Petersen is not physically attracted to her; one is a short chance encounter which soon ends with no lasting positive or negative trace; and the last is the one and only great love of his life. Petersen changes time itself in order to save her from a gruesome death and lives happily ever after with her. == Bibliography ==