A short-story written by Desmond Bagley and first published in 1962, the year before his first full-length novel The Golden Keel, has just been republished over on Philip Eastwood’s The Bagley Brief website. Welcome, Comrade is a must-read for fans of the author, highlighting as it does his interest in a genre many didn’t know he was capable of writing for.
It may be 58-years old now and definitely of its time, but it demonstrates the flexibility of Bagley’s writing style and the creative ideas behind it.
The author’s American agent, Scott Meredith Literary Agency, still hold rights to the story so it may not be reprinted elsewhere. Philip’s behind-the-scenes work has involved talking with the agent, the trustees of the Bagley estate and one of the foremost science-fiction magazines, Fantasy and Science Fiction, to bring this story to light once more.