Alfred Coppel, Alfredo Jose de Arana-Marini Coppel (November 9, 1921 – May 30, 2004) was an American author. Born in

Oakland Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third largest city overall in the Bay A ...

, he served as a fighter pilot in the United States Army Air Forces during World War II. After his discharge, he started his career as a writer. He became one of the most prolific

pulp magazine Pulp magazines (also referred to as "the pulps") were inexpensive fiction magazines that were published from 1896 to the late 1950s. The term "pulp" derives from the cheap wood pulp paper on which the magazines were printed. In contrast, magazine ...

authors of the 1950s and 1960s, adopting the pseudonyms Robert Cham Gilman and A.C. Marin and writing for a variety of pulp magazines and later "slick" publishers. Though writing in a variety of genres, including action thrillers, he is known for his science fiction stories which comprise both short stories and novels. Planet stories 1950sum

Science fiction

Coppel's first science fiction story was "Age of Unreason" (1947) in '' Amazing Stories''."Alfred Coppel" in ''The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction'' (1999) edited by John Clute and Peter Nicholls: 264 Other short stories include "The Dreamer" (1952) about a man called Denby, who wants to be the first to orbit the Moon, published in '' The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction'' and reprinted in the anthology ''Best Short Shorts'' (1958) edited by Eric Berger. His

post-holocaust The Holocaust had a deep effect on society both in Europe and the rest of the world, and today its consequences are still being felt, both by children and adults whose ancestors were victims of this genocide. Evidence in Germany German socie ...

novel '' Dark December'' (1960) describes the aftermath of

nuclear war Nuclear warfare, also known as atomic warfare, is a theoretical military conflict or prepared political strategy that deploys nuclear weaponry. Nuclear weapons are weapons of mass destruction; in contrast to conventional warfare, nuclear w ...

. As Robert Cham Gilman, he wrote the ''Rhada'' sequence of science fiction novels aimed at the young adult market. These space operas, set within a galactic empire, comprise ''The Rebel of Rhada'' (1968), ''The Navigator of Rhada'' (1969), ''The Starkahn of Rhada'' (1970) and a

prequel A prequel is a literary, dramatic or cinematic work whose story precedes that of a previous work, by focusing on events that occur before the original narrative. A prequel is a work that forms part of a backstory to the preceding work. The term " ...

called ''The Warlock of Rhada'' (1985). ''The Rebel of Rhada'' is an expansion, with many changes including a significantly different ending, of "The Rebel of Valkyr," published in 1950 under his own name and included in Brian Aldiss's collection ''Galactic Empires''. '' The Burning Mountain: A Novel of the Invasion of Japan'' (1983) is an

alternate history Alternate history (also alternative history, althist, AH) is a genre of speculative fiction of stories in which one or more historical events occur and are resolved differently than in real life. As conjecture based upon historical fact, altern ...

depicting what could have happened if the United States and its allies had been forced to invade Japan in 1946, had the Trinity test of the Fat Man nuclear design on July 16, 1945, failed. This is based on the Operation Coronet and Operation Olympic, United States battle plans for the invasion of Japan, which were rendered moot by Japan's surrender after the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Other books

In 1974, he had a

bestseller A bestseller is a book or other media noted for its top selling status, with bestseller lists published by newspapers, magazines, and book store chains. Some lists are broken down into classifications and specialties (novel, nonfiction book, cookb ...

with the suspense thriller ''Thirty-Four East'' about the Arab–Israeli conflict. Another political thriller was '' The Apocalypse Brigade'', 1981, about the United States at war with global terrorism. And based on his own experiences as World War II fighter pilot, ''Order of Battle'', a gritty account of a P-38 Lightning pilot.

References

External links

* * *
A biography of Coppel in German

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Coppel, Alfred 20th-century American novelists American male novelists American science fiction writers 1921 births 2004 deaths Writers from Oakland, California United States Army Air Forces officers United States Army Air Forces pilots of World War II 20th-century American male writers Military personnel from California