mankind under the leash, being a true and faithful account of the great upheavals of 2037, with portraits of many of the principles involved, as well as reflections by the author on the nature of art, revolution, and theology, by Thomas M. Dish 1966. This book was also known as The Puppies of Terra. For those curious, the Ace Double on the other side is Ursula K. Laguin, planet of exile. The blurb just inside the cover of the Ace Double does a great job in summarizing this novel, the undemesticated man. When the alien energy creatures came to Earth in 1970, mankind tried every weapon it knew against their attack, but they were all useless. For how can you battle beings with enormous power but no solidity? Within a few short years, all of Earth was controlled by the masters, who used men as their pets and playthings. Kennels were formed in the asteroids and non-ganymede. These kennels were a type of utopia for pets, but not all kennels were the same. One kennel on Earth in specific was neglected. There is also an aspect of animal husbandry here. Pets were bred to make even better strains. Let's go back to the description in the front of this book. But finally, the day came when men had a chance for freedom. During a period of unusual sunspot activity, a huge solar prominence erupted, and the energy from that awesome explosion temporarily short-circuted the masters. For a few days, humanity was free to mount one last frantic attack on its overlords. And at the end, the fate of the entire rebellion rested on one man. This novel is based on a novel that entitled White Fang Goes Dingo. There are hints here to the nomenclature of the pets. The novellet's name may be the best name for this story. White Fang is our protagonist. His original name, Dennis White. He has a legendary father who wrote a book about being under the leash. This father was sought by the masters to breed many new puppies. If you find it slightly disturbing to hear of humans being treated like dogs, it gets worse. Those the masters have overlooked as pets are called dingoes. So all humans, and some humans who've chosen not to be pets, are dingoes, less than the pets. What is the leash? Reading from the puppies of Terra page 25, first let me say what it was not. It was not a telepathic link with the masters, any more than the tug of a leather leash on the jubiled collar of a poodle speech. It was the masters means of communicating with us, truly, but they could communicate no more to us than our minds were capable of receiving, and I can assure you that the depths of the masters will never be fathomed by even the best of our divers. The leash was simply their touch. Those floods of ecstasy have brought were nothing more than the masters way of tugging on our collar. A touch of their hand could transmute a human nervous system from gross lead to gleaming gold, or scramble a brain into idiocy with literally the speed of lightning, but it could not, without changing the nature of the beast, make a man something he was not. They could not, in short, raise us up to their own level. Desirable as the leash was, one could not coerce it. Like the state of grace, it came as a gift, or not at all. How often the pet was leashed, and the intensity of the bond depended upon the whim or goodwill of one's master. And here I must clear up another misconception. All masters are not alike. They had discrete and individual personalities, as any pet who has had more than a single master can tell you. Some of them seem to be deeply concerned for their pets well-being. How large this interest loomed in the whole framework of any master's life can never be known, for all that a pet can know about his master is what sort of interest he takes in his pets. Others simply put them into a kennel and let them languish there, scarcely ever bothering to leash them and put them through their paces. Dish uses a biblical reference to give us a metaphor of what is happening here. On page 134, your master takes care of everything for you, and leaves you so perfectly free, except that you can't taste anything from that good and evil tree, why there's nothing that isn't allowed you. In the absence of the masters, the pets are not sure what to do. They've been taken care of their whole lives. The dingos or the general population sees their chance, and they herd them up and put them into a concentration-like camp. They want to convince them that it is better to be human than to be a pet. What will happen when the masters recover and restore the energy grid? Will the pets return or will they stay with the rest of the human population? Is there a way to rebel against the alien mastery of the planet? This novel has been combined with two other novels to create an omnibus of early Dish work. His first novel, The Genocide. This is another alien invasion novel, this time making the Earth a farm. Humans are the worms and the apple of their harvest. If you go to my playlist for author Dish, you'll find this review and others. The other novel that was included in the omnibus triplicity was Echo Round His Bones. This is a unique take on teleportation. But the novel that I really thought of as I was reading mankind under leash was camp concentration. In here we have conscientious objectors who are imprisoned and then subjected to chemical tests. Will this drug greatly increase their mental capacities or will it kill them or perhaps both? As I was looking into the biography of Thomas M. Dish, I found that when he was 18 he enrolled in the army, but he was discharged and spent three months in a mental hospital. I wonder how much that experience in the late 1950s played into these novels and stories from the 1960s. Mankind under the leash being an ace double, made me wonder why Terry Carr had never signed him up for the ace science fiction specials of the 60s. I think it might have given Dish's work more visibility, perhaps even awards. Mankind under the leash made me think about what is freedom, what is choice, who do we serve, what are we doing with the domestication of animals, is there a cost to our world, to our souls. If you've seen my review of the genocides, you know that I talked about the last three words of the novel. While in mankind under the leash, the last two sentences provide a very interesting ending. If you want to read this novel, I'll be putting up a spoiler warning at the very end of this video. It'll come after the musical sting. I give this novel of masters and pets, of self-serving servitude 7.5 out of 10. If you've read this novel, I'd love to hear your thoughts. For an overview of Thomas M. Dish, I'll put a link to a video from my friend, Steve and Andrew, the outlaw bookseller. Until next time, keep reading. Alright, this is it, big spoiler alert. If you don't want to hear the last two sentences of mankind under the leash, you should leave now. For those who've stayed, I think you may still want to read this novel to understand how this came about. The last two sentences, the masters had left Earth. They couldn't stand the barking.