Lensman Series

The Lensman series is a serial science fiction space opera by Edward Elmer "Doc" Smith. It was a runner-up for the Hugo award for best All-Time Series (the winner was the Foundation series by Isaac Asimov).

The series was published in magazines, before being collected and reworked into the better-known series of books. The complete series in internal sequence and their original publication dates are:

1. Triplanetary (1948. Originally published in four parts, January–April 1934, in Amazing Stories)
2. First Lensman (1950, Fantasy Press)
3. Galactic Patrol (1950. Originally published in six parts, September 1937–February 1938, in Astounding Stories)
4. Gray Lensman (1951. Originally published in four parts, October 1939–January 1940, Astounding Stories)
5. Second Stage Lensmen (1953. Originally published in four parts, November 1941–February 1942, Astounding Stories)
6. Children of the Lens (1954. Originally published in four parts, November 1947–February 1948, Astounding Stories)

Lensman Sequel

7. The Vortex Blaster (1960. Published with the title Masters of the Vortex in 1968)

Originally, the series consisted of the final four novels published between 1937 and 1948 in the magazine Astounding Stories. However, in 1948, at the suggestion of Lloyd Arthur Eshbach (publisher of the original editions of the Lensman books as part of the Fantasy Press imprint), Smith rewrote his 1934 story Triplanetary, originally published in Amazing Stories, to fit in with the Lensman series. First Lensman was written in 1950 to act as a link between Triplanetary and Galactic Patrol and finally, in the years up to 1954, Smith revised the rest of the series to remove inconsistencies between the original Lensman chronology and Triplanetary.