Review of Victim Prime by Robert Sheckley

Humans hunting humans, in direct and indirect form, is a staple of Hollywood. Where in real life most humans hunt animals, few and far between are the movies based on hunting, however, compared to movies wherein humans are the intended prey. Seems that psychologically we've got some collective issues... Poking at this in wry, satirical fashion is the second Hunter-Victim book by Robert Sheckley, Victim Prime (1987).

Culture and civilization have deteriorated to the point humanity is bored. And to cure its boredom, it has resorted to making humans the object of bloodsport. Manhhunts now legal. Called The Hunt, the story takes place on the Bahaman island of Esmeralda, a wild west place where violence on the streets is a national, televised event. Participate in person or watch on tv, it's up to you.

Harold Erdman is a poor, country boy in New York. Wanting to earn some money for his family, he heads off to the island of Esmeralda with the hopes of getting rich in the Hunt. An innocent bumpkin, it seems like the island will eat him alive. Adding professional spotter Mike Albani to his team would seem to boost his chances of not dying immediately. Louvaine Doubray, a seasoned hunter who is down on his luck recently, however, sees a chance to get back in the spotlight with Erdman. Will the trap he's prepared work? Only time will tell.

It's impossible to appreciate Victim Prime without understanding or being aware of the subtlest of sarcasm and cynicism. The short novel is full of wit. Sheckley being Sheckley, and at times perhaps an all too obvious version of Sheckley, one can tell he is at least having fun, and more than at most, leaning a little too hard into the program.

This, in fact, sets Victim Prime apart from The 10th Victim. Where the latter was more personal in nature, the inner workings of its main characters front and center, Victim Prime is more universally human. The cast of characters larger and the sarcasm more varied across it, Sheckley strings the plot along the barest of bones, the meat and muscle in the broader commentary.

And I suppose recommendations don't come any easier than that. If you are a reader capable of understanding satire, and appreciative of it, Sheckley offers the reader a delicate variety of jaded angles on this animal we call humans, this thing called life, and the paradoxical fascination we have with killing and death. If you're coming here looking for a Hollywood-styled human-hunting-humans story, best to look elsewhere.