Tuesday, March 17, 2015

Various Destinations

Finished Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination, the second novel in Classic American Science Fiction: Five Classic Novels 1956 - 1958. Much taken by the verve of the writing. Some highly pointed social satire directed at the lifestyles of the rich and famous and a rich sense of the varieties of English likely to be generated in the future. Great revenge plot, a la The Count of Monte Cristo, though I didn't really get the ending. Amazing to think this dates from 1956. If I'd read it cold with no sense of context I think I'd have guessed at publication in the 1990s, it feels so contemporary, so hip,somehow.

The volume will be accompanying me as we travel north yet again. I'm hoping to finish at least two more of the novels in the days of leisure to follow.

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