Two novellas from the Golden Age of SF. Generally the ACE Doubles are short early novels by authors who are writing for the SF pulp magazines.

"We Claim These Stars" by Poul Anderson is a typical space opera and could be skipped.

"The Planet Killers" by Robert Silverberg is better then expected. I have mixed feelings about his novels. Some are just creepy for no reason and some are worth reading. This one had the standard Silverberg creep but was a good story anyway. ( )

2 stars for Anderson's We Claim These Stars, 1/2 for the Silverberg's The Planet Killers. TPK is just silly, and not in a fun way. 5 spies from Earth are sent to blow up a planet that Earth's mega-computer (only one is mentioned) has predicted will attack Earth in about 75 years. Blowing up a planet seems to involve nothing more than 5 strategically placed small devices, apparently made by Macguffin, Inc. How this could work is never explained because it's irrelevant to Silverberg. What he wants to write is about a man sent to do a terrible deed, and angsting over it for weeks. Every human who knows the aliens agrees that they are vile and disgusting. The cover illustrates a dance to the death that is a popular night club entertainment. The romantic interest is an anthropologist studying the aliens because of their innate evilness. This is a dumb story that takes itself way too seriously, and gives no indication of Silverberg's eventual maturation as an author.

WCTS on the other hand is a good introduction to the many weaknesses but also the clear strengths of early Poul Anderson, and golden age SF in general. There's a fair amount of pulp action, including actual battles with blasters(!), a lot of James Bond, wretched characterization, especially of the romantic interest, and aliens galore who look strange but talk and sound just like stock movie characters. Also weak to the modern eye is something once considered a selling point of the Flandry series: his deep belief that he was only temporarily staving off the Long Night while an idiot emperor blithered about. This aspect of the Flandry character has not aged well, sounding now repetitive and flat-footed. So what's to like? Well, those battles, blasters aside, are typically well-told and more brutal than you might expect for the 1950's. And most important, every once in a while, the real SF kicks in and the physics of space and the other planets comes front and center in prose that speaks of wonder and strangeness, with detail and familiarity that mainstream fiction writers never achieve. ( )