Subtitled Reviews from another world! and published in 1975, Bad Space Hotels was quite likely partly the inspiration for the Space Vacation novels by Joachim Tung-Deprezant of a few years later. Unlike those novels, though, Marshall Wickstomp’s foray into literature disregards storyline in favour of fictional reviews of hotels (with problems) on planets throughout the galaxy.
The book is quite funny to start with – although the use of the word “space” as an adjective does wear thin after a while – but gets darker towards the end, a result of problems in the author’s personal life: house repossession, liquidation of his company manufacturing Space Frisbees, premature baldness, and most influentially, a messy divorce. This is easy to see with a comparison of one of the early bad space hotel reviews with a later one.
Early:
The Triton Excelsior is perfectly located for the Space Convention Center but our room was too close to the rooftop launchpad. While we appreciated the great view of Space City Gamma and the bonus sight of the entire Spacegridball field during the tournament final my tertiary wife felt the deafening roar and retro rocket plumes that cascaded onto us during our digital candlelit dinner on our 829th floor balcony spoiled our anniversary.
Later:
I thought this would be the only hotel I’d ever need. I thought I would be able to stay here forever. I was wrong. It looked good on the outside, at first. But inside there was not enough space illumination. The darkness seemed to grow like a cancer. The bed was hard, cold, and unforgiving. The windows were covered in astrosoot. Looking out from inside made everything seem bleak. There is a foulness in the corridors that permeates everything it touches. I would not recommend the Hotel Caroline on Arcturus IX to my worst enemy, although I understand my former best friend Dave likes his regular room in the basement.
Wickstomp disappeared in 1983.
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