Are you tired of the old usual plot lines? This is your answer

books:


	• The Stars My Destination Alfred Bester Vintage, 1996 - 272 pages average customer review:based on 221 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

firey vengence sparks adventure and self-improvement

Considering its 50+ age, it's a solid piece of SF.
Sometimes heralded as the grandfather of cyberpunk (as many books tend to be labled), it's a interestingly techy novel. Lots of ideas thrown into a tub full of characters on a one-way plot to a fine blend.

What starts out as a sub-average joe works his way through suffering and up to revenge. He transforms himself, through his inferno-like revenge, into an articulate human. However, his actions don't correct themselves as his language patterns had. His conditioning is on display through his relationships with other characters. While he may not be on my top 20 favorite characters in SF, his journey is detailed and novel. On top of a good story, there are surprisingly numerous bits of technology involved in the plot, whether major or minor.

If it were written nowadays, it would have been a 4 star book. But considering its age, the craftsmanship from that era merits this book a 5 star rating.

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Are you tired of the old usual plot lines? This is your answer

So.

If you are a sci-fi reader like me and you haven't read it, Get it and read it.

Done and done.
...

Ok a bit more. This book has a lot of uniqueness in it. The whole thing from high level concept of mental teleportation, to how that impacts society, to hiding the importance of our hero until the end, to his change, his mission...on and on.

In the world of so much retread plots and bland sci-fi, this book stands apart. It will go in my short stack of re-readers.

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Bester's Best

I have read this book repeatedly since the early 70's when I first learned of the novel. I have also read everything Bester has written in the scifi category. I have lost so many editions of this book (including a first edtion) loaning it to friends for their enrichment only to never have it returned. This book has served me as inspiration of human endeavor and spirit. I have studied psychology and am employed as a Director of Social Services with a treatment program. This book entails many Jungian principles plus confrontation of the bright and dark aspects of our personalities. It is easily read re: length, but do not disservice yourself with a quick read. This book will stir your soul related to intropection and self-assessment. Buy it, borrow it, steal it out of a library if you have to.

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Dated, but Great

This book is over 50 years old, and it shows. There seems to have been a wave of more literature-minded sci fi authors to come later, and works like Dune or Hyperion make this one look rushed, silly, pedantic, and shallow.

However, I think you could consider science fiction of this age to be its own sub-genre, including works by Bester, Heinlein, Asimov, and others. It might seem campy, but it's fun. The allegory may seem overwrought, but these guys were breaking new ground at the time. I think if Bester thought he could have gotten away with writing two 700+ (think Hyperion or Robinson's Mars books) page monsters to tell this story he would have jumped at the chance. I don't know, maybe at the time editors underestimated the attention span of the average scifi reader, maybe grouping them in with comic book fans. The books of this generation are fast-paced, action packed, and brief (for the most part), and basically share a lot of characteristics with pot-boilers, pulp fiction.

I really admire this generation of writers, their quest to serve up something of real substance in such a limited format.

So yeah, I can't really disagree with reviewers here who rip on this book for being farfetched, or the characters for being shallow or archetypes, or for it being just plain silly at times. But I can't help seeing the book in context. It's not great literature, but it's an exciting read, and the reader can't help but be a little intrigued, if not by the science then by the theme (pedantic as the delivery might be).

I guess either you like this subgenre or you don't. I am starting to like it more and more, and I think this is a wonderful book, one of the best from this era.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

Such is the official verdict on Gully Foyle, unskilled space crewman. But Gully has managed to survive for 170 days in the airless purgatory of deep space after the wreck of his ship, and has escaped to Earth carrying a murderous grudge and a secret that could change the course of history.

The novel which in large part inspired both the cyberpunk movement of the 1980s and the science fiction New Wave of the 1960s, THE STARS MY DESTINATION has an unrivalled claim to be the most influential sf book of all time.

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