George H. Smith (October 27, 1922 – May 22, 1996) was an American science fiction author. He is not to be confused with George H. Smith, a libertarian writer, or George O. Smith, another science fiction writer.
Kar Kaballa, The Second War of the Worlds, and The Island Snatchers are a weakly associated series, featuring a protagonist named Dylan MacBride, and set in the land of Avalon. The first was published by Ace Books, and the others by DAW Books.
According to a legend, Avalon is the place where King Arthur was taken when he was dying. In Avalon, Earth is a place of legend, separated from Avalon by a dimensional gateway, and what is legend in one place is real in another.
In Kar Kaballa, Dylan MacBride, the son of a famous explorer in Avalon, attempts to warn the Empire in which he lives (fairly similar to the late-19th century British Empire) of an impending invasion by the Gogs. The Gogs are a nomadic race equivalent to the Mongols, living on a continent separated from Avalon by a narrow sea. Their ruler is Kar Kaballa, and they worship a deity named Cythraul who demands human sacrifice and wishes to emerge and consume the world.
MacBride's attempts are unsuccessful because the Empire assumes the Gogs cannot cross the sea barrier that separates the continents and, in any case, the Navy would stop them. MacBride's explanations that the sea barrier that separates the continents freezes over once every fifty years and that the freeze is due to happen again, giving the Gogs ready access to Avalon and making the Navy powerless to stop them, are ignored. Thus, the 19th-century-equivalent culture must contend anachronistically with an invasion of a barbarian horde similar to that of Attila the Hun or Genghis Khan (but armed with formidable, advanced weaponry).
MacBride must team with Clarinda McTague, an appealing sorceress who worships the goddess Keridwen, a naval officer, and a visitor from Earth who is trying to sell a new weapon called a Gatling gun to the Imperial authorities, to attempt to stop the Gogs and prevent Cythraul from emerging from his underground lair and consuming the world.
It's a comical story, combining the "Yellow Peril" threat popular in old novels, a Great Old One as per Lovecraft, and elements of Celtic mythology.
Druid's World is a variant of the same story, featuring a protagonist named Adam MacBride, but again set in an "Avalon" which combined features of 19th century England (although the naval mutinies are similar to those of the Napoleonic Wars, the Spithead Mutiny in particular) with features of the 5th or 6th century Byzantine Empire.
Quite different is Smith's nuclear war novel Doomsday Wing. It shares many plot elements with the more famous film How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, but with reversed allegiances — where the film depicted a fanatic anti-Communist American general initiating an attack on the Soviet Union on his own initiative, in the Smith novel there is a fanatic Russian Communist attacking America without any authorization.
