Jacques Sternberg (April 17, 1923, Antwerp, Belgium – October 11, 2006, Paris)[citation needed] was a French-language writer of science fiction and fantastique.
(source: Lamediatheque.be) Sternberg, a very apt helmsman, owned a diminutive 12 Ft dinghy (Zef class, excellent for day cruising but slow and utterly unfit for racing) and often undertook arduous coastal treks, even in comparatively bad weather.
An anarchist at heart, he rejected organized regatta and racing – Not unlike Bernard Moitessier, the famous ocean vagabond – and wrote a biting satire of yachtsmen, sponsors and yacht clubs, in his erotic-nautical novel Le navigateur published at the peak of Eric Tabarly's success.
In Sternberg's works, the causes of terror are not ghosts or vampires but the modern-day city, often depicted as a giant, evil entity, ready to crush the hapless humans who dare live within its body.
Sternberg's novels exhibit the same dark, misanthropic characteristics: La Sortie est au Fond de l'Espace [The Exit Lies at the End of Space] (1956) (with a touch of humor) or Attention, Planète Habitée [Beware, Inhabited Planet] (1969) (minus the humor) follows the same, merciless logic.