A Question of Humanity: A Review of Ken Hart’s Behind the Gem
(Gypsy Shadow Publishing, 2010), ISBN: 978-0-9844521-7-0 By Joey Madia Behind the Gem is an entertaining and thought-provoking journey through one man’s experience with an alien race. Solidly sci-fi, but with the kind of sentiment and romance not usually found in the genre, Hart’s tale provides plenty of action, technology, and telepathy as it poses many of the Big Questions. When a hostile race of aliens called the Baleorans attacks Earth, a group of humans, trapped in a building transplanted on another planet, struggle to make sense of their present and their future. One of their number, a man named Raymond Meinhardt, winds up the captive and soon after the Consort of one of a race of kangaroo–horse hybrid type beings, eight feet tall, called the Draasen. They are a race of telepaths with advanced technology and a feminine-ruled society. ...