The Listeners - James Gunn

I haven't been very adventurous in my reading for the Damon Knight Grand Master reading challenge. Seven of the ten books I've read so far have been by authors I have read other works of, while two others were acknowledged science fiction classics. For the eleventh read I decided to pick a book by someone I knew very little of. James Gunn doesn't have as long a bibliography as some of his contemporaries and quite a lot is short fiction. He made quite an impact on the genre nevertheless. Besides writing, Gunn is a noted critic and teacher as well as the director of the Center for Study of Science Fiction. The Listeners (1972) is a fix-up novel, various parts of it appeared in Galaxy Magazine and Fantasy and Science Fiction between 1968 and 1972. It is probably its best known novel, but apparently not one instantly recognized as a masterwork. Gunn missed out on all awards and nominations save one for the Campbell award in 1973. There have been a whole bunch of editions of this book with different forewords, introductions and afterwords. The copy I've read is a 2004  edition which features an introduction by H. Paul Shuch, an American physicist heavily involved with SETI, a foreword by Thomas Pierson, founder of the SETI institute, and and afterword by the late Freeman J. Dyson, British-American mathematician and physicist. I guess this book is still well loved in scientific circles.

In 2028, the SETI's search for extraterrestrial life is still ongoing without ever having picked up a single signal that indicates intelligent life. Director Robert McDonald, a staunch believer in the project, is facing ever more difficulties keeping SETI funded. McDonald himself is beginning to wonder if the project is worth the personal sacrifices he has to make. Then, a signal is received that is unmistakably of alien origin. A broadcast is received from a the direction of the star Capella, 45 light years distant. It changes everything. The project, the world, our place in the universe. Humanity is about to enter into a conversation with a ninety year time lag.

I like science fiction a lot but in my mind at least, it doesn't tend to get really interesting until the late 1960s. A time when writers started to incorporate more social sciences into their works, pay greater attention to their characters and move towards more literary forms of writing. The Listeners is a novel that tries to do some of these things. It is in essence a first contact story, which are a dime a dozen in the genre. With a lot of attention dedicated to radio telescopes, it is also firmly rooted in hard sciences. I've been to an installation in Westerbork, the Netherlands many years ago and it is an impressive sight. It is also not the exciting kind of science one might expect in a science fiction novel. It is painstakingly clearing up and deciphering signals, it passive, it is what the title suggest, listening. When you think about it, it isn't an obvious choice of subject for a science fiction novel.

Because of the fairly slow pace of events, Gunn as a lot of time to delve into the psyche of his characters. The story is very introspective. McDonald in particular thinks a lot about what he is doing and why it is worthwhile, but also if it isn't taking too much of a toll on his family. Other characters reflect at length about the changes in society over the course of the novel which spans almost a century. As the novel progressed and society gained more and more utopian characteristics, I kept wondering if Gunn thinks that contact with extraterrestrials will change our look at the universe in such a way that the world's problems become fixable or that it would have happened anyway. Fear would have seemed an equally likely reaction to me, even if realistically the aliens were too far away to be a threat.

Limited but the power of With radio waves taking ninety years for a round trip, it is essential to pack as much information as possible into one broadcast. The message received is deceptively simple, even if it takes the best minds and an enormous amount of computer power quite a while to decipher it. The process of understanding it, the debates and speculation, the attempts at suppressing the find, efforts to fit it into existing religious frameworks and of course the question how to respond all make for fascinating reading. It is not as flashy as an alien invasion but a lot more realistic description of how first contact might happen.

Structurally it is an interesting novel as well. Gunn litters the McDonald sections in particular with quotes from literary greats, usually in the original Spanish, Italian, German, Latin and French. Quite unusual for an English Language novel. The Listeners is divided in five sections, four of which are followed but what Gunn calls a computer run. These are snippets of all manner of news sources, quotes from scientists (Carl Sagan and Frank D. Drake and Guiseppe Cocconi to name a few), philosophers and science fiction writers. They add a lot of detail to the reader's understanding of the SETI project although it appears to have expanded and changed beyond what Gunn envisioned in 1972. One might say his selection is a bit one sided. Quite a lot of it is very supportive of the project and its goals. There has been quite a bit of criticism of the project for as long as it has existed. Ranging from people who consider it dangerous to alert aliens to our presence, to those who SETI is unscientific to begin with. Most of the characters have links with the organization, Gunn might have used the computer runs to balance it a bit.

In the end I thought The Listeners featured a little bit too much promotional material for the SETI project but it is a fascinating read nonetheless. Gunn picked a subject that isn't particularly sexy and yields very little in the way of visible or easy to understand results and turned it into a good story anyway. It is a bit melancholic at times, some readers will not particularly care for the characters. I guess I can see why it didn't sweep the awards or turns up in lists of must read classics. After having read it, I think it does deserve more recognition than it has received. This novel is definitely one of the pleasant surprises encountered in my Grand Master Reading Challenge reading. I may have to check out some of Gunn's short fiction in the future.

Book Details
Title: The Listeners
Author: James Gunn
Publisher: BebBella Books
Pages: 195
Year: 2004
Language: English
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 978-1-932100-12-9
First published: 1972

Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury

Last month I ran a poll to help me decide which book should be reviewed work number 300 on Random Comments and tied it to the Grand Master Reading Challenge for which I still have to read a couple of novels. Ray Bradbury won. I had expected one of the big names I hadn't covered it to get it, perhaps Jack Vance or Robert Heinlein but, as one commenter pointed out, with Bradbury's passing at the age of 91  just a few months ago, perhaps it is not so surprising he come out the favourite. I haven't read anything by Bradbury before so I figured I'd read the book he is best known for. Fahrenheit 451 was published in 1953 so it's too old to have won any of the major science fiction awards but it has been added to countless list of best books in science fiction and is well regarded outside the genre. It is one most influential dystopian novels, often mentioned in one breath with Orwell's 1984 and Huxley's Brave New World. In short, a book with quite a reputation.

Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopian novel set in a future America where books are outlawed and a fireman's job is to burn them instead of putting out fires. One such man is Guy Montag, who unquestionably burns book, the source of all dissent in society. Until he meets the 17-year-old Clarisse that is. She talks to him about ideas that make no sense and about doing things that no rational, we ll adjusted man should even consider. She makes Montag thing and without him understanding why, he develops an aversion against his job, starts questioning his life and develops a curiosity about books. Montag is in trouble.

Bradbury's prose is not something you regularly encounter in science fiction. His style is overflowing with metaphors, with lengthy stream of consciousness passages when Montag is face a crisis or living though a breakthrough. Bradbury demands your full attention when reading it, he makes you feel the panic, stress and confusion of Montag in what might appear rambling scenes to the unfocussed reader. By today's standards it is a short novel but it is pretty intense reading. It certainly took me a few pages to get used to this style. I guess it's not surprising people see different things in this book but I was ab it surprised to find the book's message wasn't what I thought it would be.

Book burnings are something of a symbol and censorship, promoting ignorance, removing ideas that don't fit into a particular world view. Books, or rather the ideas they contain, can be dangerous to people with narrow ideas on what society should look like. Books make people think, they stimulate curiosity, open up the mind to experiences one would normally not encounter. Banning books and controlling the media are tools of dictators. Fahrenheit 451 is frequently seen as a work warning us of these dangers and protesting state sponsored censorship. From what I have read about it, I was more or less expecting something along those lines. Much to my surprise, that isn't exactly what this book is about. His depiction of society is chilling but it is not the book burning that is doing the damage. In fact, from the people around Montag you might say they are unnecessary.

Probably the most disturbing element in the novel is the way Montag's wife Mildred surrounds herself by television. The is completely absorbed in empty soap operas or news that is composed of meaningless one liners and takes the shape of cheap entertainment more often than not. Mildred is entirely disconnected from her husband and the world around her. It is not the suppression of ideas that is keeping the population in check, it is just that books are completely replaced by a passive, strictly controlled form of entertainment. It doesn't encourage people to think or be critical. They just have to take it in. When Montag asks his wife what her favourite show is about, she can't really produce a coherent answer. In fact, she is surprised he even asks. It should be obvious. What Bradbury is objecting to here is the replacements of books by simplistic television and other media. If Bradbury felt like that in the 1950s, what must he have thought of the current media landscape? Whatever you may think of Bradbury's position, it clearly is still relevant.

Thematically and stylistically I can see why this novel does well in literary circles as well as the science fiction genre. It does not escape the shortcomings of many science fiction novels of the period though. Montag is the central character and decently rounded but the rest of the cast is mostly there to symbolize a part of Montay's dilemma and rarely rise above the archetypical.  It is also stuck in a very traditional pattern of gender rolls and, by now, fairly dated ideas on future technology. It has aged more gracefully than many of his contemporaries though. Bradbury doesn't focus on a technological idea in this novel and his ideas on the media have turned out to be pretty accurate at some points. The depiction of Montag's pursuit struck a chord with me in particular.

All things considered, Fahrenheit 451 is a remarkable novel in the context of the science fiction genre at the time as well as the literary acclaim it has received. It didn't turn out to be quite the book I had expected but it certainly delivers a thoroughly disturbing image of the future. Right at the end, Bradbury surprised me again, with a ray of hope that Montag is offered. In the same novel Bradbury is showing how easy it is for people not to notice the emptiness of their existence and the lengths they will go to, to preserve something they value highly. For those of you who are still predicting the end of the dead tree type of book, I think  Bradbury would disagree. And for what it's worth, so do I.

Book Details
Title: Fahrenheit 451
Author: Ray Bradbury
Publisher: Voyager
Pages: 227
Year: 2008
Language: English
Format: Mass Market Paperback
ISBN: 978-0-00-654606-1
First published: 1953

Dragonsdawn - Anne McCaffrey

As I noted before, the Damon Knight memorial Grand Master Award is seriously short on female authors. Only four out of the twenty-eight winner are women. Since one of the objectives for this year is to read more work written by women I am going to try to read all four for this challenge. I read Forerunner by Andre Norton and The Wind's Twelve Quarters by Ursula K. Le Guin earlier this year. Next up is Anne McCaffrey, who was honoured with this award in 2005. Picking a book was a bit of a problem. McCaffrey is best known for her Pern novels, of which I have read exactly one: Dragonflight, published in 1968. I didn't like it very much. I'm sure it was sensational at the time but forty years on, it seemed like a pretty mediocre novel to me. An Australian friend of mine is a bit better acquainted with McCaffrey's oeuvre and she suggested I try Dragonsdawn (1988). Chronologically it is the first of the Pern novels (there are a few shorter pieces in the same era or even set before the novel) but McCaffrey wrote it some twenty years after Dragonflight. I must say, the fact that she had a bunch of novels under her belt by this time shows in the writing.

After a long journey though interstellar space, three ships full of colonists arrive in the Rukbat system where they intend to colonize the third planet. When they bought into the expedition, they knew it would be a one way trip. The ships are nearly out of fuel, they will be cannibalized to provide the colony with materials. Pern, as the third planet is referred to, is a remote place, far away from the busy shipping lanes of the galaxy and has only been surveyed briefly. The planet has developed its own ecology but is without sentient life. There is every possibility to create an utopian society, away from the wars and conflicts of the more densely populated regions of space. The colony is developing rapidly with only minor squabbles along the way when the colonists become aware of a major threat to their existence. Threadfall. Their rapidly declining technological resources will not be enough to save them. Other, more radical options will have to be considered.

McCaffrey made Pern and the colony the central characters really. She uses the third person point of view throughout the novel and she uses a lot of different characters to tell the tale. None of them are central to the narrative. She uses them to show a particular development in the colony, although some characters seem only marginally important to the story. I suppose you could see Sorka and Sean as central as they represent the future of Pern but they don't really get enough screen time to be called the main characters. All this jumping around makes it hard to get really emotionally invested in any of the characters. It really is a chronicle of the first years of human settlement on Pern and should be read as such. Some readers might prefer a more character oriented narrative.

Pern has always been a curious mix of science fictional and fantastic elements. It has been clear form the start that humans are not native to the planet, but society on Pern is mostly low tech and the presence of dragons makes it lean towards fantasy. This novel is primarily science fiction, perhaps even space opera. McCaffrey describes the arrival of the fleet and disembarkation in detail. The logistics of putting thousands of people as well as supplies to establish a colony on the surface are complicated and contain the origins of one of the conflicts that will arise in the new colony. I thought this section slowed the beginning of the book down a bit more than necessary. On the other hand, there is something compelling about beginnings. We are seeing the birth of a world in this novel, the planet is a blank canvas for the colonists to work with.

Throughout the novel we watch the colonists struggle with declining supplies and problems keeping their technological base at an adequate level. The planet has plenty of natural resources but turning these into high tech machinery or even fuel for the remaining shuttles is not an easy matter. It also doesn't appear to be the goal. The colonists long for a simpler rural style of living and the large stretches of unoccupied land provide ample opportunity. From a highly organized group lead among military lines, they quickly evolve into pioneers used to fending for themselves and taking care of their own business. The novel shows us an interesting reversal when the colony is threatened. One that obviously doesn't go without a lot of friction.

Interesting enough, McCaffrey addresses one of my pet peeves when it comes to books including dragons: their ecology. Putting aside quibbles over how to get something as large as a dragon into the air, there is a limit to how large a predator a given ecosystem can support, and dragons, especially in large numbers seem to defy that limit. It i s a problem more fantasy novels struggle with, not only with dragons. You frequently encounter regions with an unlikely number of very dangerous large predators. It shouldn't come as a surprise them that dragons are a species created by a very clever geneticist with a specific purpose in mind. Apart from dragons, the colonists are introducing new species on the planet at a tremendous pace. I don't think any ecologist would even dare to predict what such a injection of invasive species would do to native life but McCaffrey at least makes an attempt to make it sound plausible. Interesting enough the settlers aren't particularly careful in dealing with the ecosystem, sustainable hunting practices for instance, have yet to be developed. McCaffrey gave it a try, clearly thought about the origins of her world, but our understanding of ecosystems would have to improve an awful lot before such confidence in changing a world so dramatically would be justified. I can think of novels that handle ecological themes more successfully.

Dragonsdawn is a prequel of sorts and I guess to an extend is suffers from the problems many of these books almost inevitably run in to. The outcome is known, the solution to the threat the colony faces is obvious, the colonists' loss of their technological base a certainty. I guess that problem is what really tips the scale for me. Compared to Dragonsflight, McCaffrey's writing has matured a lot but with a more or less predictable story and the book's tendency to jump from one character to the next in rapid succession, it is not really a satisfactory read. None of the characters really develop enough depth to draw me into their story or make me feel more that a touch concerned for their wellbeing. I do get the feeling that if you have read more of the Pern novels than I have, some of the names and events mentioned will have more meaning than they have to me. Dragonsdawn can be read on its own just fine but in the end I think it much more enjoyable for the real fan of the series.

Book Details
Title: Dragonsdawn
Author: Anne McCaffrey
Publisher: Corgi Books
Pages: 473
Year: 1988
Language: English
Format: Mass Market Paperback
ISBN: 978-0-552-13098-1
First published: 1989

White Mars - Brian W. Aldiss

While rereading Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy, books I consider to be among the very best in science fiction, I came across various references to White Mars Or, The Mind Set Free by Brian W. Aldiss, written in collaboration with prominent physicists Roger Penrose. Robinson's utopian vision of a terraformed Red Planet is not something everybody would see as ideal or even morally acceptable. In the Mart trilogy Robinson pays a lot of attention to the discussion between what he calls the Reds, a faction opposed to terraforming the planet and convinced of its intrinsic value, and the Green faction who would exploit the planet and make it more hospitable to human life. Aldiss (and Penrose) wrote this novel as a reply to Robinson's vision of utopia portrayed in his Mars novels. The debate about how to set up a utopian society on Mars is the single most important topic in this book. As a nod to his source of inspiration, Robinson even had a street named after him. As far as I can tell White Mars is out of print, I had a hard time tracking down a useful copy without resorting to the countless torrents out there. After having read it, I can't say I am terribly surprised by the relative obscurity of this book. The philosophical argument may be sound, as a work of literature Robinson's novels are far superior.

Since this novel is a reply to Robinson's work I find it very difficult not to see it in the light of the Mars trilogy. In fact, when I first heard about the novel I questioned the wisdom of trying to cover ground Robinson had already so thoroughly explored. No matter how unfair it may be to compare books of different authors to each other, this novel practically begs for it. I'm not sure how much sense this review will make if you have not read Robinson's novels. You have been warned.

A few decades from now, humanity has established a permanent presence on Mars. The harsh environment makes it necessary to hide under domes, always having to be car eful with supplies of air and water. A huge consortium known by the acronym EUPACUS, to which almost all of the economic powers on Earth have contributed, manages the huge undertaking of colonizing the planet and the programs to send a few privileged people up to Mars. Until fraud, corruption and mismanagement on a massive scale are discovered that is. The consortium collapses and the economic crisis that follows, makes sure nobody will be travelling to Mars in the near future. The people already there are stranded. The colony is more or less self sufficient by now, but to most people there, counting on a short stay on the Red Planet, being cut of from Earth is nothing short of a disaster. Others see an opportunity. Under the guidance of the visionary Tom Jefferies, the first steps are being taken towards a utopian society.

The approach to the colonization of Mars present in Red Mars (1992) is quite different from what we find in White Mars. In Robinson's vision the initial stages of colonization are very much oriented towards exploitation of the planet, setting up part of a conflict that will run throughout the trilogy. Aldiss immediately takes a different route:

'All environments are sacrosanct,' Anstruther declared. 'The planet Mars is a sacrosanct environment and must be treated as such. It has not existed untouched for millions of years only to be reduced to one of Earth's tawdry suburbs today. My strong recommendation is that Mars be preserved, as the Antarctic has been preserved for many years, as a place of wonder and meditation, a symbol of our future guardianship of the entire solar system - a planet for science, a White Mars.'

Leo Anstruher addressing the General Assembly of the United Nations - Chapter 1

The speeches made at the General Assembly are not quite as rousing as the debate between Ann Clayborne and Sax Russel if you ask me. Something that turns out to be a problem in much of the novel.

Conceptually, I guess you could say the hand of a master is present in this novel. The collapse of the organisation that organizes space travel to Mars and the financial crisis that follows are eerily familiar to the event surrounding the collapse of Lehman Brothers for instance. An event that took place nine years after this book was published. I guess Aldiss felt that in order for his utopian society to have a chance it needed to develop in isolation. Something that would never happen if Earth had anything to say about the matter. So far at least, he is in agreement with Robinson although the details differ considerably.

Adiss does not just concern himself with what society should look like though. He makes a link with physics where, I assume, is where we can find part of Penrose's input. It is a good thing I had just brushed up on quantum mechanics while reading Ted Kosmatka's Divining Light or a lot of it would have been right over my head. In fact, quite a lot of it still was. The search for what we think of as the Higgs boson, very much in the public eye at the moment given the results of CERN, is still ongoing in the novel. Aldiss and Penrose speculated that the Large Hadron Collider, construction of which started in 1998, would not find a particle in the traditional sense and that the mystery of how particles attain mass would remain. The way things are going now, it looks like CERN will observe, or perhaps already has observed, a Higgs boson. In 1999 this was be no means certain though. In the novel, what we think of as a particle is described as a smudge, the parameters of which can only be more narrowly defined by installations capable of even greater energies than the one unleashed by the Large Hadron Collider under conditions that cannot be found on Earth. Mars is the ideal location, provided humanity does not disturb the planet too much. In effect, this research blocks attempts at terraforming. A second practical obstacle besides the financial one.

The question of the Omega Smudge (or Higgs particle if you will) is linked in the novel with the question of human consciousness. The subtitle of the novel is The Mind Set Free and how to achieve this is the focus of many a discussion. I must admit that although I could follow the speculation on physics for the most part, the connection with conciousness remained nebulous to me. what is clear to me is that there is a direct link between to two. A link that is used in the novel to answer one of the most intriguing questions about Mars: is there life on the Red Planet? As it turns out, the answer is yes, but not in any shape or form ever imagined by scientists. Perhaps the most interesting aspect about this life form is that it appears to be responding to the human presence on the planet. Have they disturbed it's unusual ecology?

The way this lifeform (I won't spoil the story for you by giving too much detail) is described strikes me as a little far fetched. Then again, who knows what alien life might look like. What I didn't like about it element in the story it that Aldiss again uses it to throw up a barrier against the development of the planet. The third major practical obstacle against terraforming, that most likely is not present on Mars. At this point I began to wonder if Adiss had lost faith in the strength his own argument. Still, conceptually it is quite a challenging novel. People who like hard science fiction certainly have something to sink their teeth in here.

Nevertheless, I liked Robinson's books a whole lot better, mostly based on more literary arguments. Many people have trouble with the Mars books because of Robinson's tendency to loose himself in lengthy descriptions of landscapes, science or interior monologues. For me that is part of what makes these novels so good. Robinson makes you experience Mars as if you are standing on the planet yourself. I never felt a single passage was a plain infodump. With Aldiss, I do get that feeling a lot. He even has one of the physicists in the novel lecture the other characters (and by extension the reader) in a rather condescending way about the progress of the search for the Omega smudge. It often feels forced into the narrative and doesn't always contribute to the development of the characters. There is also quite a lot of material that is written in such a way that a reader who isn't all that interested in the subject discussed will have a hard time working their way though these sections. Personally, I wouldn't go so far as to call it boring but I know plenty of readers who wouldn't hesitate to do just that.

There we hit on a second problem with this novel. Most of it is told from the perspective of Tom Jefferies (read: Thomas Jefferson) and his adopted daughter Cang Hai. Adiss fails to give these two characters, or a number of secondary characters their own voice. The entire book is written in a rather monotone, almost formal style that is more suitable to an academical work that a work of fiction. To a point this works for some of the more technical scenes. The debates that take place amongst the stranded humans are quite tame because of it. These debates center on how to best develop their utopian society, touching upon the deepest, most sacred ethics and beliefs of people. Consider also that the people sent to Mars are generally highly educated and accomplished in their field. Not people to let others do their thinking for them. It is not that there isn't disagreement, but not on the scale you'd expect and certainly not as intense. Jefferies way to utopia (mind you, he doesn't always get to do things his way but still more often than not) is apparently the only logical path?

Some of the arguments made, make a lot of sense. They manage to do away with a lot of historical ballast that is holding humanity back on earth. On the other hand there is quite a lot of ivory tower blathering going on in this novel. People engaged in highly philosophical arguments when their very existence on the planet is quite tenuous at best. Somehow I don't really see a groups of human beings reach some sort of consensus quite that easily under such stressful circumstance. Jefferies has neither the authority nor the (military) strength to back up his attempts to form a utopian society. In a true utopian he wouldn't need either of course, but certainly early on in the novel, they are no where near that point yet. It is a far cry from the passionate debates at Dorsa Brevia in Green Mars (1993) and and the constitutional congress covered in the early stages of Blue Mars (1996). To the point even where it made me wonder if Robinson, one of science fiction's most notorious optimists, is actually more cynical about human nature than Aldiss and Penrose.

Adiss and Penrose have delivered a fairly impenetrable counter argument to Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy. Maybe he is right in saying that Robinson dismissed the 'Red' (or I guess Adiss would call in White) argument for humanity's treatment of the planet but he doesn't present it in a particularly engaging way. Without the connection to Robinson's work, I don't think I would have thought it worth my time to be honest. While the novel is certainly intellectually challenging I found the prose rather stiff and incapable of conveying the passion Jefferies must have felt about creating a new society. The characterization is pretty uniform, each of the character delivering their part of the tale in a detached and almost academic style. White Mars is clearly the work of a great intellect (or maybe I should say two great intellects), but, without having read any of his other books, I do get the impression we are not seeing Aldiss at the top of his abilities here.

Book Details
Title: White Mars Or, The Mind Set Free
Author: Brian W. Aldiss
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Pages: 323
Year: 2000
Language: English
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 0-312-25473-3
First published: 1999

Beyond the Blue Event Horizon - Frederik Pohl

Beyond the Blue Event Horizon is the second book in Pohl's Heechee series, a series that started out with the 1972 novella The Merchants of Venus. This novella was reprinted in Platinum Pohl among other collections. The first Heechee novel, Gateway (1976), is one of his best regarded solo novels and won him a whole shelf full of awards. I guess it is not surprising that after that kind of success, a sequel has a hard time living up to expectations. I've heard a lot of people say this is one of those series you should only read the first book of. Pohl went on to write three more books and a bunch of short fiction, none of which I have read, but personally I didn't think Beyond the Blue Event Horizon a bad book. It is very different from Gateway though, that has to be said.

After successfully facing his successes and failures at Gateway, Robinette Broadhead is now living the life of a very rich man. He has married and has diverse interests in various profitable businesses as well as close ties with the Gateway corporation and even quite a bit of political influence. In other words, he has it made. Still, there is the nagging feeling of guilt that the woman who is the love of his life is stuck in a singularity. In business problems arise as well when an expedition to a distant Heechee installation, which Robinette hopes will help combat the chronic food shortages on Earth, meets with unexpected problems. It takes 25 days for instructions to reach the explorers, and as the situation in the outer solar system gets more and more out of control, Robinette's problems increase. Desperate action is needed.

One of the most striking differences between Gateway and Beyond the Blue Event Horizon is that Pohl employs a lot of different points of view in the second volume. In fact. Robinette doesn't even show up until the fourth chapter, some 50 pages into the novel. A lot of the major players in the novel get a point of view, as well as some of the machine entities, but there are quite a few of them, so we only get to scratch the surface of most of these characters. Where Pohl was very concerned with the psychology of Robinette in the first novel, the plot is obviously more important in the second. That is not to say that Robinette's internal struggle is not an important part of the story, he is still this petty, selfish but basically decent person we meet in Gateway, but Pohl leans quite heavily on events in the previous novel to convey this to the reader.

The Heechee on the other hand, although still very absent, are much more important to the story. The artifact being explored is clearly one of theirs but has been circling the sun since before humanity's ancestors learnt to use tools. It has a history of its own and that history includes other intelligences as well. Pohl reveals that history through these many points of view, gradually revealing a new part of the mystery with each chapter. It is this revealing that may put off some readers. In Gateway, the Heechee are a mystery. With only their incomprehensible artifacts and structures around, very little was actually known for sure about them. It made the story unpredictable in a way. With a Heechee artifact around, you never know what might happen. The increased understanding in Beyond the Blue Event Horizon changes that. Personally I don't think you can reasonably expect the mystery to stay intact for several books, there has to be at least some progress to keep the story moving,  but some readers will no doubt prefer their own questions, answers and guesses over those of Pohl.

Pohl's answers to the riddle the Heechee and their seemingly impossible technology pose, involve a lot of guesswork and quite a bit of cosmology and physics. I must admit some of it was right over my head. Still trying to wrap my head around Mach's principle for instance, an idea that was apparently one of the inspirations to Einstein's general theory of relativity. It also contains a number of references to Stephen Hawking's work on black holes. Where electronic shrink Siegfried is Robinette's discussion partner of choice in the first book, in this one his science program, aptly named Albert, takes over. It must be said, Albert is very good at explaining his guesses, which, especially towards the end of the novel, become more and more important to the plot. One would expect a program modelled on one of the greatest physicists of all time to do a little less guessing, but Robinette often orders him to do so anyway. Some of these guesses are obviously a set up for the next novel. It appears fairly obvious what Robinette's next project will be. This novel, after all, does not solve the issue that is the basis of his ever present guilt.

Pohl's work often have a satirical undertone. Many of his works criticize the excesses of capitalism for instance, or are fairly cynical about the political influence and proper healthcare money can buy. Robinette is not adverse to using his wealth to get things done his way for instance. It is not quite as apparent in this book however. The most notable thing about this novel is that it is drenched in fear. The fear of meeting the unexpected in space, where there is no retreat and very little margin for error. More than a few science fiction novels feature fear, suspicion and paranoia.  Especially the so called big dumb object stories, of which Gateway could be considered a variation, usually contain it in a general measure. I guess it is not as claustrophobic as Gateway, but the knowledge that aliens are near weighs on the characters. Due to the number of point of view characters, it is not as oppressive as in the previous novel, but it is almost always present in the background as each of these characters experiences their own personal flavour of fear.

There is one element in this novel that I absolutely didn't like, and that is the way Robinette's wife is portrayed. She is practically perfect in every way, knowing what is wrong with him before he knows himself and allowing him to go after the love of his life, who according to physics should be out of reach forever. Events in Gateway is more than enough reason to feel guilty but Robinette's treatment of his wife certainly adds to the problem. Siegfried's work doesn't appear to be done. The story is a bit open ended on this point. It looks like Pohl will get back to it in the third volume.

I guess you could say Pohl took a bit more conventional approach in writing Beyond the Blue Events Horizon. It makes the book less groundbreaking than Gateway was and probably is part of the reason why it didn't win any of the awards it was nominated for. The scope of it is obviously much wider too, and the many switches in point of view makes it appear a bit less structured than its predecessor. If you view the story as the unveiling of (part of) a mystery, it makes more than enough sense to me. In the end I guess I agree with many of the critics that it is not quite as good a novel as Gateway was. I also think it would have been nice if it had been a little more self contained; if it were fantasy I'd say this book suffered from the middle book syndrome a bit. That being said, it is a good science fiction novel in the classic sense. Plenty of hard science, scientific speculation and a much larger scope than the first book in this series offer their own attractions. I guess it depend on what you want out of a novel but I thought it was an enjoyable read.

Book Details
Title: Beyond the Blue Event Horizon
Author: Frederik Pohl
Publisher: Orb
Pages: 317
Year: 2009
Language: English
Format: paperback
ISBN: 978-0-7653-2177-0
First published: 1980

The Wind's Twelve Quarters - Ursula K. Le Guin

The Wind's Twelve Quarters is Le Guin's first collection of short fiction and was published in 1975. Quite unusual for a single author short science fiction collection, it is still in print decades after it has been first published. It is generally regarded as the strongest of her collections of short fiction. Not having read the others, I don't have an opinion on that but I did think The Wind's Twelve Quarters is a bit of a mixed bag. It contains a total of seventeen stories, presented more or less in the order they were published in and cover the period between her first publication in 1962 and 1974, by which time she had published some of her best know and most critically acclaimed novels. Le Guin chose this order so the reader could experience her growth as an author. In that respect the collection certainly succeeds. The later stories are much stronger than the earlier ones. Most of the stories have a short introduction by Le Guin about the inspiration for the story and the editorial changes compared to the original magazine publications. A fair number of stories in the collection are what Le Guin calls psychomyths.These stories are hard to pin down but they are independent of setting and often have a surreal quality to them. Le Guin herself puts it like this:

...more or less surrealistic tales, which share with fantasy the quality of taking place outside any history, outside of time, in that region of the living mind which - without invoking any consideration of immortality - seems to be without spatial or temporal limits at all.

Le Guin on psychomyths - Foreword

Most of the stories that are not tied to her novels seem to fall into this category. Quite a few of the stories are linked to her novels though. There are Earthsea stories in this collection as well as stories set in the Hainish universe and even a story tied to her novel The Dispossessed (1974). The opening story, Selmy's Necklace (1964), is essentially the prologue of Le Guin's first novel, Roccanon's World (1966). It is set in her Hainish future history and in some ways, reminded me a lot of some of Poul Anderson's Technic Civilization stories. It is seen mostly form the point of view of a member of a less technically advanced race trying to retrieve an heirloom that that was lost decades ago. She doesn't properly comprehend the consequences of her request to be allowed to visit the aliens but to the reader the tragedy that is unfolding is quite clear. A science fiction story written in language that is more often found in fantasy. This story clearly shows why Le Guin usually doesn't make too rigorous a distinction between the two.

The second story is April in Paris (1962) is the earliest story in the collection and Le Guin's first sale. I can't say I liked it much. I guess you could say it is a time travel story. I thought it was pretty predictable with more than a bit wish fulfilment in it. Le Guin then moves on to a story that is also a bit predictable but conceptually more interesting. The Masters (1963) deals with a man who is brought up in a very strict guild like environment where things have always been done a certain way and where deviating from this way, or trying to improve upon it, is heresy. He can't resist the lure of progress though. There is another story that is thematically related to this one in the collection. The Masters is very dark, full of despair. Stylistically probably not the strongest piece but certainly an interesting one. The Darkness Box (1963), like The Masters is a piece that can be considered a fantasy or perhaps an early psychomyth. It's a story with a sense of inevitably about it, of pointless repetition. Not a story that makes one feel happy although one of the characters sees things differently.

The Word of Unbinding and The Rule of Names (both 1964) are Le Guin's first Earthsea stories. I haven't read any of the Earthsea novels so putting them into the perspective of the whole series is going to be a bit difficult. I think they lay the groundwork for the system of magic found in the Earthsea novels. A system that appears to be quite sophisticated judging from these few pages. The stories are uncut fantasy, the only ones in this collection. I will have to read one of the Earthsea novels to be sure but I think I prefer Le Guin's science fiction. Still, Earthsea is on the to read list.  

Winter's King (1969) is another story tied to one of Le Guin's novels. It is set on the same planet as The Left Hand of Darkness (1969), a novel in the Hainish cycle that is also on my to read list. The version in this collection has been changed to fit the novel more closely and features the wintry world of Gethen. Le Guin plays with titles and particular pronouns to underline the androgyny or the inhabitants. The story itself is one of mind control and a King struggling to do what is best for the kingdom. It certainly makes me curious about the novel. Gethen seems like an intriguing place and the way gender appears to play no role in society opens up all kinds of interesting possibilities. Something that struck me about this story is how, like in Selmy's Necklace, Le Guin presents a technologically less advanced society in a science fiction story. Some readers would say there is a hint of fantasy in this story.

The Good Trip (1970) is a story that is probably contemporary. As the title suggests it is about drug use among other things. The trip makes it quite a strange story full of weird cognitive leaps and odd situations. Le Guin didn't seem to be opposed to people experimenting with LSD at the time, which was no doubt frowned upon. She does mention in the introduction that she feels that "people who expand their consciousness by living instead of taking chemicals usually come back with much more interesting reports of where they've been." Now there is a bit of wisdom for you.

Nine Lives (1969) is one of the longer pieces of the collection and is a classic science fiction story. One that explores the possibilities of a new technology, in this case cloning. Le Guin studies the bond between genetically identical individuals, who shared most of their formative years and education and have been brought up to function as a team. The idea is disturbing on many levels. These people are a product, designed to outperform ordinary humans but also to be so self sufficient that without each other, they'd be lost. In a way, it is a barrier to get ideas of their own, which of course Le Guin can't help but challenge. As with the best science fiction stories, this one contains plenty of food for thought.

The next story, Things (1970) is another psychomyth. I guess you could say it is about a man who has to take the last leap. It is beautifully written but personally I think it doesn't quite take that many words to convey the message. Le Guin creates quite an elaborate setting. One which would have been exploring in more detail, but Le Guin takes the story in another direction and much of the setting ends up being only marginally relevant to the story. This one was a miss for me. The collection continues with A Trip to the Head (also 1970). All I have to say about this, is that it went right over my head. I guess Le Guin's writing is too intelligent for me sometimes.

What follows is the story with the most beautiful title in the collection. Vaster Than Empires and More Slow (1970) is a story in the Hainish Cycle, covering the lonely journey of a ship of explorers. Given the nature space travel at relativistic speeds, they give up everything they've known to go on this journey. Something not everybody is willing to do. The crew consists of misfits, people who have nothing to loose and the occasional completely dysfunctional character. A recipe for trouble and indeed, the first planet they survey, puts them to the test. This again is pretty straight forward science fiction, with perhaps a touch of horror. Or suspense if you will. I liked it a lot but it is not outstanding.

The Stars Below (1973) explores in a bit more depth, one of the themes we also encountered in The Masters. Scientific curiosity clashes with custom or religion and ends in violence. Where The Masters deals with the event itself, this story shows us the aftermath. An astronomer who's instruments were destroyed hiding in an abandoned mine from his tormentors. It is a tragedy, even when he finds something to replace his interest in the stars. A moving story. I thought it was one of the better ones in the collection.

The collection continues with another science fiction story that is unrelated to a novel. The Fields of Vision (1973) about a group of astronauts who discover a strange city, for lack of a better word, on Mars that messes with their perceptions. One of them does not survive the trip back, the other two have lasting problems with their sense of hearing and sight. Their adjustment to this situation takes very different routes. I liked how Le Guin linked our perceptions with religious experiences in this story, and how much our brain relies on what our senses tell us. Most people trust what their senses tell them without question. In this story the characters know the input they are receiving is somehow changed. The author depicts this as quite a scary experience.

The next story is a very short, to the point science fiction story in which the main character is a tree. Direction of the Road (1974) is a highlight in the collection for me, a brilliant little story about relativity. It would spoil the story to say anything about the plot but is such a strange reversal of how we think of the world works, that I just had to read this story again right after I finished it. If I had to pick a favourite, this story might well be it.

For The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas (1974), Le Guin received a Hugo Award as well as a nomination for the Locus Award. It is another psychomyth, perhaps the one closest to the loose definition Le Guin put in the foreword to this collection. The story is very abstract in a way, no details on the setting, the author basically tells us to imagine our own, or characters are given. The story revolves around a scapegoat, one who is necessary to keep the rest of society happy. Once again a disturbing thought. One, as the story points out, not everybody can live with.

The final story of the collection is also one of the strongest ones. The Day Before the Revolution (1974) won a Nebula and a Locus award and was nominated for a Hugo. The story is tied to the novel The Dispossessed, a novel that I still consider to be one of the best in science fiction. It's main character is Odo, who is a historical figure in the novel, the inspiration for the anarchistic society on Anarres. She may be honoured after her death, the life of a revolutionary is not easy. The story shows us an ageing Odo, full of grief and a premonition of death. The subtitle of The Dispossessed is An Ambiguous Utopia and this story is another expression of it. Odo achieved a lot but at a high price. I love the final paragraph of this story. As far as I am concerned, it should have won that Hugo too.  

The Wind's Twelve Quarter ends on a high, that is for sure. Some of the stories in this collection are no doubt among the best Le Guin as produced. All things considered, it isn't one of those very rare collections that manage a consistently high quality though. It is a collection that shows Le Guin's style, themes and development as a writer however. With links to her most important works and some award winning stories, perhaps it is not so strange this collection has been in print for more than three decades. I would not recommend someone with an interest in Le Guin's work to start here, it is probably better to have read a few novels first, but for the real fan it is definitely a must read.

Book Details
Title: The Wind's Twelve Quarters
Author: Ursula K. Le Guin
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Pages: 303
Year: 2004
Language: English
Format: Mass Market paperback
ISBN: 978-0-06-091434-9
First published: 1975

I, Robot - Isaac Asimov

For my fifth Grand Master reading challenge, this project may well be the only one at Random Comments that runs on schedule, I decided to read something by Isaac Asimov. Several of his novels feature prominently on all kinds of recommended reading lists and he is certainly one of the genre's towering figures. I read his Foundation novels (the original trilogy) a while ago and I can't say I was overly impressed. Asimov didn't lack ideas but his prose is barely serviceable and he has the tendency to explain everything in great detail to his readers. Perhaps I should have picked something from later in his career but I, Robot (1950) is such an iconic work in the genre that I felt I should give it a go. Much to my surprise, I liked this book better than the Foundation novels. Not that the flaws in Asimov's writing are absent in this novel, but the quality of the stories is more consistent and on the whole, I though them more entertaining as well.

I, Robot has been described as a fix-up novel or a short fiction collection. I think of it as the former but it is certainly true that most of the text appeared in the shape of various short stories between 1940 and 1950 in a Super Science Fiction Stories and of course John W. Campbell's Astounding Science Fiction, to whom the book is dedicated. Asimov has connected the stories with bits of interviews with Dr. Susan Calvin, a robotpsychologist working for U.S. Robots and Mechanical Men, Inc, as she is looking back on her long career in the field. She is not always the main character, or even a character, but she does provide just enough context to put the stories into a general future history. Asimov does this in his usual efficient way, not wasting a word more on it than absolutely necessary. I understand Asimov changed some of the details in the stories to make them more consistent. He is certainly making the most of repackaging these short stories with minimal effort here.

Being written in the 1940s, most or the novel is pretty badly dated and some of Asimov's depictions of the future will seem decidedly strange to new readers. We have caught up with the start of the series now. I, Robot starts in 1996, with the story Robbie (1940), about a primitive robot and playmate of the eight year old Gloria. The girl treats the robot like she would a human friend and this makes her mother uneasy. Robbie wil have to go. Asimov uses the story to outline the resistance against artificial intelligence, the fear of superior robots replacing human beings. First in the work space and later completely. It is an introduction to his famous three laws of robotics, which he will name in the second story Runaround (1942).

"We have: One, a robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm."

"Right!"

"Two," continued Powell, "a robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law."

"Right!"

"And three, a robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws."

Powell and Donovan discussing the Three Laws of Robotics - Runaround

Runaround, set in 2015, introduces the field testers Powell and Donovan and is a story in which Asimov examines the conflicts that may arise from these three laws. The laws are the kind of logic that Asimov seemed to have liked, simple, elegantly formulated and its intent easily understood. He was smart enough to see they are by no means flawless though. Most of the stories contain situations in which some conflict between these laws makes the robots behave unexpectedly or cause them to be caught in a loop, often jeopardizing the project they are working on or the lives of the unfortunate humans in their company. In Runaround it happens in the supremely hostile environment on Mercury, which shows just how little we knew about conditions on the planet in 1940. It gives Asimov plenty of room to speculate though.

Some six months after events in Runaround Donovan encounter a different sort of problem. In Reason (1941), which I consider to be one of the strongest stories, Asimov takes a more philosophical tone when our field testers are stuck with a robot who will not accept the (in its opinion) contrived and unnecessarily complicated explanation for its existence. A case of Occam's razor gone blunt I suppose. This story contains the most memorable quote in the book if you appreciate sarcasm.

"I have spent these last two days in concentrated introspection", said Cutie, "and the results have been most interesting. I began at the one sure assumption I felt permitted to make. I, myself exist, because I think..."

Powell groaned, "Oh Jupiter, a robot Decartes!"

QT-1 discussing its own existence.

Cutie retreats from reality along the same lines as a human being might do in the end by resorting to religion, shutting out the need for an explanation. It is one of several instances where robotpsychology runs parallel to human psychology. Something even Susan Calvin reluctantly admits later on in the book.

In Catch That Rabit (1944) robot behaviour shows some parallels to buggy software as well. It sees our field testers use drastic measures to get the robot back under control. Asimov spends a lot of the later part of the story lecturing (disguised as a conversation between Powell and Donovan). I can't say I particularly liked it. Liar! (1941) is more interesting.Set in 2121, it deals with a robot that can read minds. The conflict arises when it receives one sets of instructions verbally, that don't correspond with the real desires of the person giving the instructions. Calvin's behaviour in this story will no doubt make some readers groan but the concept is a strong one.

By the time Little Lost Robot (1947), robots have become quite advanced and exploration of the solar system is well under way. In 2029, one such space program employs robots with a slightly altered set of robotic laws, enabling them to ignore a human being putting themselves in danger. If the mere existence of such a robot was to become public knowledge on earth, the political consequences would be dire. When one of the robots is lost, the people who run the project are in deep trouble. Calvin is called upon to find it. The three laws of robotics can be quite a restriction I suppose, so the temptation to do away with them is clear. Asimov presents a perfectly reasonable argument for doing so in this story. It might have worked better if there had been more of an element of danger in the story though. The missing robot is still unable to actively do harm. Personally I wouldn't have been particularly worried to have it around.

In Escape! (1945), positronic brains have become so advanced they are capable of calculations comparable of those of a super computer. The Brain, as this robot is called, is set to the task of creating the means for interstellar travel, a problem that has already cracked a competing robot. Calvin is aware that there is a conflict with the three laws but doesn't know where. The company tries to avoid the problem by feeding The Brain the information is small sections. It features a lot of irrational behaviour on the Brain's part. I'm not particularly fond of this story but as usual, Asimov's rationale is perfectly logical.

The book then moves on to 2032, a year that poses a completely different challenge to Susan. A Turing with a twist. In Evidence (1946), Stephen Byerley is a brilliant district attorney running for mayor, when one of his opponents accuses him of being a robot. How do you prove someone is a robot when the subject is not cooperating and very aware of his rights? Written during the aftermath of the second world war, it is easy to see what Asimov (of Russian Jewish descent himself) was aiming at. It is the most politically charged story in the book, with a lot of it focussing on the suspicion and outright hatred of robots despite the fact they are incapable of harming a human being. Where Asimov usually explains the entire plot to the reader in detail, this story is certainly food for thought.

Interestingly enough I, Robot then goes to show us some suspicion of robots might actually be warranted. In The Evitable Conflict (1950), set in 2052, Calvin has realized that robots rule the world. They are responsible for the allocation of goods and services and the division of labour of the entire planet, which by that time is divided into four super states. Calvin is called upon to explain apparent imperfections in the solution the robots provide. These turn out to have a perfectly reasonable explanation in line with the three laws of course. This story has aged very badly, Asimov's future, at this point in time, seems positively silly, although from his perspective it might not have been entirely impossible. It was not my favourite part of the book though. Partly because of Asimov's tendency to explain everything and partly because of the fact that the plot is mostly a guided tour though planetary government in 2052.

With I, Robot Asimov lays the foundation of what would become one of the three main series in his career as science fiction writer. He is not technically a good writer (at this point in his career at least) but back in the days where science fiction was very much seen as the literature of ideas, you probably couldn't do much better than Asimov. He had ideas and was not afraid to explain them at length. For the modern reader a lot of I, Robot is dated but with lasting contributions to the genre such as the three laws of robotics and the positronic brain, it is one of the novels that shaped the genre. One of the thoughts that kept returning while reading this novel is just how many things Asimov discussed that were in the experimental stage at the time, or didn't exist at all. All things considered, I think it deserves at least some of the praise that is heaped on it.

Book Details
Title: I, Robot
Author: Isaac Asimov
Publisher: Bantam Books
Pages: 224
Year: 2004
Language: English
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 978-0-553-80370-9
First published: 1950

Forerunner - Andre Norton

The Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award clearly shows signs of the imbalance between men and women in science fiction. Of the 28 winners, only 4 are women. The first woman ever to win this award was Andre Norton (1912-2005), who was thus honoured in 1984. Ursula K. Le Guin, Ann McCaffrey and Connie Willis have followed since. Norton had a long career as an author. She started publishing in the 1930s and kept on writing until her death in 2005. I have only read one novel by her, Black Trillium, which she co-wrote with Marion Zimmer Bradley and Julian May.  A book that is in my opinion a disaster. Forerunner (1981) is not one of her best known works, but apparently it is the first novel published by Tor, a publisher that had a great impact on American Science Fiction and Fantasy in the past few decades. Tor has reissued it recently.

Orphan girl Simsa grows up in the ancient city of Kuxortal. A place that has so many layers of buildings on top of each other that the founding of the city is lost in time. It is a place of commerce and antiquity and a place the space traders visit during their endless travels across the universe. For Simsa the universe is a lot smaller however. She ekes out a living among the burrowers. The city's poorest, digging though the layers of ancient civilization for items worth trading for. Under the guidance of a woman Simsa refers to as the Old One, she has learnt to survive but now that her mentor is gone, she has to face the world alone. Simsa is different form the people around her, something of which she is very well aware. To keep her independence and find her origins, she will have to find a way out of the poverty of the burrower's community.

Forerunner is a novel with one leg in Fantasy and the other in Science Fiction, as we would see things today. Kuxortal is a city that doesn't seem to have developed much beyond the renaissance technological level. On the other hand, right outside the city, space ships land regularly. The city is a hub of both planetary and galactic trade. A place with a long history but also one that clearly has origins elsewhere in the universe. The author probably wouldn't have thought much of the distinction but if I had to put it in one genre, I'd say it is definitely more fantastical.

We see the story entirely through the eyes of Simsa, who goes through a lot of personal growth over the course of the story. She is suspicious and rude throughout most of the novel. Trust is dangerous in her world and so she is very reluctant to grant it. It leads to a number of situations where she is very rude and clearly shows her ignorance of the world beyond Kuxortal. What bothered me a bit about this story is a revelation at the end of the book that changes her from ignorant to having at least some idea of how large the universe really is. It not only felt forced, it was also imposed on the character in what was almost a religious blending of spirits, rather than through her (quite harrowing) personal experiences during the story.

That being said, the interplay between Simsa and the start trader named Thom T'seng, to which she sees here fate tied, is comical at times too. Simsa doesn't recognize it, but the star trader is being very patient with her. His plans to do things that she knows are impossible or go to places that she knows mean certain death. She is proven wrong repeatedly of course, but none of it seems to disturb the star trader. He ploughs on, regardless of how stupid and naive Simsa seems to think he is, occasionally producing a small technological miracle to save the day. It would have been nice to see it from the other side as well.

A lot of Norton's works are what would be considered young adult these days. In terms of themes, plot and complexity, this novel would certainly fall in that category these days. The language Norton uses is interesting though. She has a distinct preference for long sentences with lots of commas. Some of it is quite overwritten and I found myself rereading lines a lot early on in the novel. It takes a few pages to get used to it.

Kuxortal was old but it did not die. Its citizens had become an incredible mixture of races - sometimes of species - or mutations and new beginnings of life forms, springing out of old. Kuxortal had been favored ages ago by the fact that it had come to birth at the meeting of the river Kux (which drew upon the trade of a full continent, wafting boats and rafts to the western sea) with that same sea. The harbor was a safe one even during the worst of the wet-season gales, its natural protections added to by the ingenuity of generations of men who knew all the perils of sea and wind, of gale and raider attack.

Description of the city of Kuxortal - Chapter 1

I guess you could say some of this novel is reminiscent of the golden age pulp magazines for which Norton wrote earlier in her career. Not generally a part of the genre I enjoy most.

Despite all the negatives I did enjoy Forerunner. It is not a memorable novel but certainly a lot better than my first encounter with Norton's writing. Simsa is a character you can really root for, even if she is too stubborn for her own good sometimes. If you are willing to overlook Norton's prose and the occasionally illogical plot in favour of a good adventure, this book might be a good read. Norton published a sequel named Forerunner: The Second Venture in 1985. I won't rush to the nearest book store to get it but I won't rule out reading it at some point either.

Book Details
Title: Forerunner
Author: Andre Norton
Publisher: Tor
Pages: 272
Year: 2012
Language: English
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 978-0-7653-3191-5
First published: 1981

Dying Inside - Robert Silverberg

Robert Silverberg must be one of the most prolific authors in Science Fiction. I'm not sure if there is such a thing as a complete bibliography on the web but the ones I've seen rival those of Isaac Asimov. Since the 1950s Silverberg has written science, fiction, fantasy, soft-pornography, non-fiction, countless short stories and edited shelves of anthologies. A quick search turns up at least two dozen pseudonyms. Not all of his output is highly regarded. Especially the early works, a period during which Silverberg was basically writing as fast as he could and selling his material to pulp magazines, is considered of lesser quality. Dying Inside (1972) was written during a later period in his career, lasting from the late 1960s till his first retirement in 1975. During those years Silverberg produced some his most celebrated science fiction novels. Works in which he takes a more literary approach than earlier in his career.

David Selig is a middle aged man living in New York. When we first meet him, he is making a living selling term papers so Columbia University students, a place where he once studied himself. David is not a happy man, for the last few years he's been feeling his talent to read people's minds fading. It is a talent that brought him an unhappy childhood as well as  immense grief and countless problems in his personal life over the years, but also one that defines him as a person. Now that it is slipping away from him, he feels he is dying inside.

For a Science Fiction novel, the story contains very few speculative elements. Selig is a powerful telepath but that is just about the only thing science fictional to it. The novel is a character study of Selig, quite introspective and entirely focused on his struggles with his talent and accepting his loss of it. The author plays with memories and flashbacks in the novel, eventually covering most of Selig's life. Maybe this lack of action and the less plot driven character of the novel are the reason why it didn't win any of the rewards it was nominated for. It was nominated for the Nebula, Hugo and Locus awards, all three of which ended up being won by Isaac Asimov's The Gods Themselves. I haven't read that book, but from the description I'd say it is a bit more in line with what readers would have expected from a science fiction novel in the 1970s.

Selig is obsessed with literature, poetry, plays, classical music and philosophy and Silverberg stuffs in a lot of references to famous works of art in the story. I've always found it interesting that a science fiction novel is much more likely to contain such references to the classics of literature than the other way around. Silverberg included one of Selig's papers on the works of Franz Kafka for instance. Which is not only a reference to one of his literary influences but also an example of the different styles of writing we find in the novel. The author also includes letters and has the Selig talk to himself in the second person in an attempt to distance himself from some of his more shameful acts. The shifts between different phases of Selig's life in combination with the different styles of narrative help keep things interesting.

At several points in the novel I wondered how much of the story is autobiographical. There are some similarities between Selig and Silverberg. Both from Brooklyn, both studied at Columbia, both with an intense interest in literature. I haven't come across any biographies that mention Silverberg being Jewish but, given his name, it is certainly possible. A writer peering into the head of his characters (or his own head if you support the idea that all characters are some aspect of the author) is not that different from reading the mind of the people around you. Selig seem to make the link between the loss of his talent and his diminishing sexual prowess. More than one critic has pointed out the parallel between the loss of Selig's talent and Silverberg's loss of joy in the creative process. Something that apparently appears in different forms in other novels from this period and may have contributed to his first retirement. It sounds plausible to me but given my unfamiliarity with Silverberg's work I have no idea how accurate it is.

Selig is a very depressing character during most of the book. His life is an unhappy one. He thinks of his talent as a curse most of the time although loosing it upsets him greatly as well. Reading the minds of others is often painful to him. Their true opinion and motives are completely clear to him and it often includes things he'd rather not hear about himself. He finds it almost impossible start a relationship with a women when he can read her mind and the few times that he does try, it inevitably ends in disaster. One of he most telling examples of Selig's problems with his talent is when he takes a peak in the mind of the woman he is making love to and finds she can spare not a single thought about him when she is about to climax. Not entirely unexpected perhaps, but it is a devastating experience nonetheless. It is the leitmotiv of his life I guess, people don't really want to know the truth of what other people think of them and Selig shows us why. They shade the truth, hedge or outright lie in order to function socially. I do wonder if the emphasis Selig puts on the ugly things he finds in the minds of those around him isn't a bit overdone. Do doubts, fears, distaste and anger really outweigh the positive things that must be present in a person as well? His reaction to knowing what people think may say more about Selig himself than the people he reads.

I guess it shouldn't come as a surprise that Selig's talent can be used for personal gain. Selig does so himself in various, usually petty ways but not until he meets Tom Nyquist does he realize the full extend of what is possible. Nyquist is the only other character we meet that has David's talent and he is quite unapologetic about it. He makes lots of easy money on Wallstreet with inside trading and is not adverse to using his talent to manipulate people. Selig is amazed and repulsed by his style of living, Nyquist life is one of luxury but Selig feels it is empty and ends up disgusted with him. Embracing his talent in that way makes Nyquist a lot more comfortable with himself than Selig is however, and to Selig, Nyquist can't lie about that.

Another striking thing about Selig's view on the world is how much it revolves around sex. It motivates our actions to a much greater extend than many people would be comfortable admitting but since Selig tends to see right through others, it is very much exposed to him. Finding partners is rarely a problem for him since he knows for certain who is available and interested. Which of course takes something of thrill of the chase away. Where sexual attraction or desires are mostly kept hidden for others, something not discussed openly or at best considered very private, it is completely exposed to Selig from a young age. It gives him a unique perspective on these matters and Silverberg is not afraid to expose his readers to it. He succeeds in showing the reader why this is as uncomfortably to Selig as it is to his surrounding.

I can see why this is a notable book among it's contemporaries. Silverberg approaches the novel in a way you don't see a lot in science fiction novels. It is a pretty dark and introspective book. I'm not sure everybody will appreciate the ending but I thought it was fitting. Dying Inside is a book that can make the reader uncomfortable by laying bare the innermost thoughts and feelings of the characters. It usually isn't pretty, but like it or not, most of us will recognize a lot in what Selig is exposed to. I can see why this novel is one of the more highly regarded novels of the period. Some Science Fiction novels age badly. In some ways this is a novel of its time but certainly highly readable today. I'm going to have to read some more Silverberg.

Book Details
Title: Dying Inside
Author: Robert Silverberg
Publisher: Gollancz
Pages: 199
Year: 2005
Language: English
Format: Mass Market Paperback
ISBN: 978-0-575-07585-2
First published: 1972

Prelude to Space - Arthur C. Clarke

Prelude to Space by Arthur C. Clarke is my second read in the 2012 WWEnd Grandmaster Reading challenge. Last month I read Poul Anderson's Tau Zero (1970), which is one Anderson's better known novels. For my second read I picked something a little less high profile. Prelude to Space is the first novel Arthur C. Clarke wrote and is generally not considered as good as Childhood's End (1953), probably the most famous of Clarke's early novels. The publication history of this story is not unusual for the period. Clarke wrote the novel in the space of a month in 1947 but it wasn't until 1951 that the whole novel was published in magazine format by Galaxy Science Fiction. It was followed by a hardcover edition in 1953. What is atypical about it, is that the novel does not appear to be based on one of Clarke's short stories. Although one of Clarke's lesser works, it has been reprinted numerous times. The edition I have read was printed in 1977 and includes a "Post Apollo Preface", as Clarke himself puts it, written in 1969.

In the year 1978 humanity is ready to for the next step in exploration, the first manned mission to the Moon about the leave Earth. Historian Drik Alexson is sent to London, where the headquarters of Interplanetary, the non-profit organization coordinating the mission, is located. He is to document the event, that will no doubt be considered one of the turning points in human history. Although Alexson is supposed to be an impartial observer, he can't help but by swept away by the magnitude of the effort and the impact it will have on human society. As the launch date nears, Alexson realizes that this event will be his life's work as a historian.

Although science fiction is much more about exploring ideas and what they might mean to society than actually predicting the future, seeing how many details Clarke got wrong in this novel is still almost as interesting as the story itself. Where Clarke goes for private enterprise as the driving factor and assumes the memory of Second World War will change the way people see armed conflict, in reality is was the tension between East and West that gave space exploration a huge boost. The need for the US to prove it could outdo their Soviet rivals resulted in a moon landing nine years before the one Clarke describes, using very different rockets to get there. Many of Clarke's novels describe futures where science, logic and reason triumphs over the petty squabbles, religious dogmas and ideological differences to achieve a peaceful and stable way of running the planet. In Prelude to Space this is treated as inevitable. Would that Clarke had been right on that point.

Another thing that struck me about Clarke's scenario is the use of atomic energy to power these rockets. These days, radioactivity makes people very nervous, and rightly so as recent events in Fukushima have shown us. Some horrendous experiments were carried out testing nuclear devices in the 1950s, clearly showing that the long term impact of radioactive substances released into he environment was still very poorly understood at the time this novel was written. The radioactivity around the launch site in the Australian desert is mentioned several times but not considered a matter of great concern. It might be technically possible to limit the risk of radioactive contamination, even in the event of a launch failure, but somehow I think it be very hard to convince the general public that it'd be safe these days.

Clarke's futures are generally pretty optimistic, sometimes even utopian, and this novel is no exception. Prelude to Space is something of a cross between a love letter to and an advertisement for space exploration. Clarke carefully connects the historical desire to travel to the stars, early science fiction and lots of technological developments, all leading to this one momentous occasion. The moment when humanity will finally leave its cradle and first set foot on a strange world. A first step on a path from which there will be no turning back. Where that path will lead, Clarke doesn't dare predict but he seems to be quite sure it is one we must take to ensure survival of the species. The author may overdo it a little in the text but his enthusiasm is contagious. It was almost enough to make me wonder why the hell we are not on our way to Mars already.

This is the tenth novel by Clarke I have read, spanning his entire career, and from those is seems obvious that Clarke didn't change his approach to writing a whole lot during his seven decades as a published author. Some sections of the novel are highly technical, with the science of space travel the main character. Alexson is the vehicle that allows Clarke to show the events leading up to the launch from up close, but he seems to have very little interest in the man himself (perhaps not altogether surprising, he strikes me as a bright but not very interesting fellow). You don't read Clarke for his well rounded characters or complex plots but for the hard science and Clarke's visions of what they may mean for future society.

Sixty-five years after it was written Prelude to Space is badly dated in just about every aspect of the story. From the technical developments to the blatant sexism that plagued science fiction in those days. On top of that, Clarke wrote a novel that reads like propaganda for a space program. It is very effective propaganda though. Despite all the novel's flaws, you can't help but be caught up in the excitement of the enterprise and the possibilities of space travel, many of which still haven't been realized. Clarke's optimism has been proven unfounded in some ways but the drive to explore space is still there. This novel might well have been an inspiration to some teenager in the 1950s to pursue a career in physics or astronomy. Clarke has gone on to write more challenging novels but for a debut, it's a decent read.

Book Details
Title: Prelude to Space
Author: Arthur C. Clarke
Publisher: New English Library
Pages: 176
Year: 1977
Language: English
Format: Mass Market Paperback
ISBN: unknown
First published: 1951

Tau Zero - Poul Anderson

I decided to sign up for the 2012 Grand Master Reading Challenge, organized by World Without End. The goal is to read and review a work by a different Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award winner every month. I decided to start with Poul Anderson, who was honoured with the award in 1998. Tau Zero (1970) is one of his better known works. It was nominated for the Hugo Award in 1971 but lost to Larry Niven's Ringworld. It is a very good example of hard science fiction, written in a time when the direction of the genre was being drastically changed by the arrival of new age authors. The novel is an expansion of the short story To Outlive Eternity which was first published in Galaxy Science Fiction in 1967. I'm not going to hold back on spoilers in this review, the title of the short story gives is one already anyway. You have been warned.

Fifty men and women are sent on the spaceship Leonora Christine to explore and, if possible, colonize a planet more than thirty light years away. To make the trip in a reasonable span of time, the spaceship has to approach the speed of light and make use of the time dilation effects that become appreciable at such speeds. Before deceleration can be set in, the engines needed to slow down the ship are severely damaged. Repairing them would mean shutting the acceleration engines off as well, which would result in a quick death from intense radiation. The ship's speeds keeps increasing, hurling the crew ever faster through space and time. Unless they can find a way to slow down the crew is doomed to live out their life on board the space ship.

Tau Zero is science fiction so hard it cuts diamonds. A physics lesson and a novel rolled into one. The publisher kindly provided the formula for the time contraction factor Tau, which equals the square root of 1 minus v squared divided c squared, where v stand for velocity and the constant c is the speed of light. In other words Tau equals zero when v equals c (everybody still with me?). In a more practical sense, the closer the speed of the ship gets to the speed of light, the larger the difference between time passing for the crew and time passing outside the ship. I understand that Anderson's use of Tau is a bit unorthodox but for narrative purposes it serves very well.

In a way, Anderson uses Tau to show us just how large the universe really is, something he is rather fond of doing in his other science fiction novels as well. As the velocity of the ship approaches the speed of light, minutes, hours, days, years and eventually aeons pass for every second of ship time. Galaxies are crossed, then clusters and super clusters to the point where time and distance becomes meaningless. In the end, Anderson takes us to the death of the universe itself and there a bit of speculation seeps in. The debate about the eventual fate of the universe is still raging, Anderson assumes the universe is cyclic and will eventually contract into a new singularity and expand again after a big bang. Although science has not come up with the proof for this yet, in literature the death and rebirth of the universe does make for a wonderful theme.

That's quite a lot of physics and cosmology for the reader to take in. The more experience science fiction reader will have come across these elements before. Alastair Reynolds for instance, include much more exotic science into his works. Anderson explains the physics clearly, even the more counter intuitive elements of relativity, but spares us quantum mechanics. Personally, I enjoyed the scientific passages a lot. That is my personal taste however, it will no doubt put some readers to sleep in a few pages. This novel requires some interest in physics and cosmology to really appreciate.

One might think that this would be enough science for a single novel but Anderson also throws in quite a lot of detail about the Bussard engine of the spaceship. This theoretical way of propelling a ship was first proposed in 1960 and has appeared in a number of science fiction novels by such authors as Larry Niven and Carl Sagan. It is basically a fusion engine which uses the minute quantities of free hydrogen in space to propel the ship. There has been a lot of debate about whether or not a ship powered in such a way would actually be able to reach relativistic speeds, but it's an ingenious idea anyway. Again Anderson explains the design of the engine and its limitations, which play a large part in the efforts to slow the ship down, very clearly. I thought the engineering was a bit less interesting than the cosmology but it is central to the plot and Anderson makes sure not to overdo it.

Hard science fiction has a reputation of paying less attention to character and character development. For Tau Zero that is definitely true. I guess you could consider the two people we meet in the opening chapter, the compassionate Ingrid Lindgren and the brusque Charles Reymont to be the main characters. They appear to be the people who keep the crew together and sane as Earth becomes an ever more distant memory. They are mostly people dealing with problems of the crew's morale and organizing efforts to solve their technical problems. Although towards the end of the book things get a bit more philosophical (the death and rebirth theme does have an effect on them), there is very little in the way of development in their characters.

Most of the novel is set in space so the future history of Earth is not all that important. We do get a glimpse of a society where Sweden has become the centre of power in the world after a nuclear war that almost doomed the planet. IKEA everywhere, surely this must count as a dystopia. Anderson, American of Danish descent, also weaves in some reverences to Scandinavian mythology, something that returns in many of his novel. It's a bit of an odd contrast really, the cyclic nature of the universe as described in this novel, reminded me more of Hindu mythology.

According to the blurb on the cover, James Blish considers this book the ultimate hard science fiction novel. There is something to be said for that. I have rarely read a novel with such rigorous scientific underpinnings. Anderson had a degree in physics and in other novels it is quite clear that he thought about the properties of fictional planets he created. In Tau Zero he takes it way beyond that and makes physics the main character. The scope of the novel, in time and space is almost beyond comprehension (something the author points out several times in the text). Anderson takes hard science fiction as far as it will go, in that sense it is the ultimate novel in this particular sub-genre. That being said, it does not escape the shortcomings generally associated with the sub-genre. I'd say it is a must read for fans of hard science fiction only.

Book Details
Title: Tau Zero
Author: Poul Anderson
Publisher: Gollancz
Pages: 190
Year: 2006
Language: English
Format: Mass Market Paperback
ISBN: 978-0-575-07732-4
First published: 1970