Commitment Hour [Hardcover]

James Alan Gardner (Author), Stephen Hickman (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: 1998

In the twenty-fifth century, Tober Cove is a wonderful place to be. With most of Earth's population long since departed for other planets, and with them the technology that makes such a journey possible, life here is simple and serene--especially for Fullin, a gifted musician whose talent commands many times the wages of a farmer or fisherman. But Fullin is twenty years old. And at that age, each person in Tober Cove must make the most important decision in life. Ominous winds of change swirl toward Fullin's idyllic existence, carrying dark secrets that will upend his beliefs, alter his view of reality and threaten his very life. But for the boy himself, there is no more room for indecision. The time has come to take an irrevocable stand and seal his fate forever. The hour of commitment is here.

From the author of "Expendable, a major new voice in imaginative fiction, here is a spellbinding adventure which dares to pose critical questions about the human condition and answer them.In the twenty-fifth century, Tober Cove is a wonderful place to be. With most of Earth's population long since departed for other planets, and with them the technology that makes such a journey possible, life here is simple and serene--especially for Fullin, a gifted musician whose talent commands many times the wages of a farmer of fisherman. But Fullin is twenty years old. And at that age, each person in Tober Cove must make the most important decision in life. Ominous winds of change swirl toward Fullin's idyllic existence, carrying dark secrets that will upend his beliefs, alter his view of reality, and threaten his very life. But for the boy himself, there is no more room for indecision. The time hascome to take an irrevocable stand and seal his fate forever. The hour commitment is here.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Nebula Award nominee Gardner (Expendable) gives a less-than-stellar performance with this silly look at the future of sex roles. In the 25th century, teenage Fullin, along with his lover, Cappie, and the other villagers of Tober Cove, enjoy the right of selecting what gender they will be for their adult lives: the "Commitment Hour" of the title, is the night when the two must make the big decision. Although Gardner lacks the finesse of Le Guin's anthropological SF, he packs his story with intriguing characters and numerous plot twists to compensate. But a visiting anthropologist, a murder, even the discovery that Fullin's mother is a hermaphrodite, do not add up to a compelling or complete novel. A convoluted climax, in which Fullin discovers the real origin of Cove's society, is just too expository and messy to supply any satisfying emotional payoff or meaningful message about gender and society.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Fullin is a young musician nearing his twentieth birthday, when all Tubor Cove youngsters must decide their sex, even if they are plainly male, female, or a despised "Neut." If a male decides he is to be female, then at "commitment hour," he disappears into a sort of incubator known as "Bird House" and, in due course, his female half emerges. It is a deeply religious moment, and the citizens of Tubor Cove have formed a kind of New Age cult around it. Commitment hour didn't originally have anything to do with religion, however, and after an outcast discovers the secret and turns murderous, Fullin and Tubor Cove have to make some basic changes. Rather a thin concept to support an entire novel, though Fullin is appealing. John Mort --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 248 pages
• Publisher: Avon (1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1568656874
• ISBN-13: 978-1568656878
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.6 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,262,066 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Sci-fi with a message., April 20, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Commitment Hour (Mass Market Paperback)

I think some of the other reviewers have missed the purpose of this book. For me, it was a very powerful statement about how our modern society shapes the relationships between men and women.

It is not, however, a ripping yarn. The plot develops gradually, Gardner spending a lot of time developing the characters and setting out the relationships between the characters. He does this really well. (Okay, so Lord Rashid of Spark is a bit weak.) The storyline does, however, gradually gather pace and it literally rips through the last 50 pages or so. Further, while the reader can see a lot of what is coming, Gardner keeps adding little twists and turns, and saves one big twist for the end.

Good stuff!!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Really enjoyable, character-driven sci-fi., October 22, 2004

By 

Maggie the Lizard Tamer (NY, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Commitment Hour (Mass Market Paperback)

This is James Alan Gardner's early work - unlike his Expendable series, it does not feature Festina Ramos, however, the League of Peoples is briefly mentioned.

The basic plot for this novel is that Earth around the 24th-25th century faces a catastrophe (overpopulation, disease, etc.) and the League of Peoples offers Earthlings a way out - those who so want can leave the planet and live among aliens learning their technology and cultural standpoints. Not everyone leaves and those who stay are left without the support of a developed civilization and the world ends up resembling that of the Middle Ages with a history (and therefore artifacts) of modern and futuristic science. At some point, those who left the Earth decide to come back and conduct social experiments using extremely advanced technology.

One of these experients is a little village whose inhabitants change gender every year up until they are 20, when having experienced being both a man and a woman during their lifetime, they decide to become one permanently. The twist is that in addition to become male or female, one can choose to become a Neut - a person of both genders. Thankfully though, even though the plot revolves around changing genders, the emphasis of the novel is more on great technology, a society that has leaped quickly forward and then rapidly backwards, and the politics of people in such a situation. The main character is very believable and his (her?) adventures make for a page-turner.

The atmosphere of this novel was similar to that of Trapped - it even features the Spark Lords. My biggest hangup about reading this novel, even though I loved all of other novels by James Alan Gardner, was that its description does not really indicate that the novel is set in the same universe as the others. I was very pleasantly surprised and The Commitment Hour was a fast read. The ending was somewhat surprising and definitely not cliche.

I give it 5 stars among Gardner's books, and 4 overall. I recommend it highly for the author's fans.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A most unusual story of gender roles in society, January 26, 2004

By 

Daniel Jolley "darkgenius" (Shelby, North Carolina USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Commitment Hour (Mass Market Paperback)

James Alan Gardner's Commitment Hour certainly isn't your run-of-the-mill science fiction novel. The author provides an interesting and sometimes uncomfortable look at the role of gender in society, but I'm not sure he is entirely successful, nor am I sure if there was some highly perceptive point he was trying to make or if he found any real answers to his own questions in this regard. The first few chapters failed to spark my interest, but in time Gardner did manage to bring a sense of life to the story and create something interesting albeit ultimately somewhat unfulfilling.

The setting is twenty-fifth century earth, a somewhat primitive and naturalistic era borne of the fact that some seventy percent of the population has left for other planets in the wake of alien visitation; the technology of man's past has largely been abandoned, its relics consigned to the stuff of legend. The aliens and the facts of the big migration are only mentioned and never really emphasized; rather, it is the unique society of Tober Cove that demands all of the author's attention. Like most new earth societies, Tober Cove is a land of farmers and fishermen; here, a priestess marks the changing of seasons in primitive rituals and the law is upheld by a representative of the legendary Patriarch. Tober Cove is unique in one regard, however; here, the children alternate their sex between male and female for the first twenty years of their lives, after which time, at the crucial Commitment Hour, each one chooses whether to live as a male, a female, or - on rare occasions - both. Neuts are rare indeed, for those who choose a hermaphroditic life are banished from the land and threatened with instant death should they return.

Fullin stands on the brink of his Commitment Hour choice, as does his life's partner Cappie. Fullin is confused enough by his feelings toward Cappie, feelings which vary significantly from year to year as his sex changes, but life gets infinitely more confusing when a scientist comes to witness and study the Commitment Hour ceremonies, bringing alongside him a Neut banished from Tober Cove twenty years earlier. Murder and other disquieting horror visits the village, and by the time Fullin and Cappie are ready to be flown to the mysterious Birds Home to make their final commitments, dramatic change indeed is blowing in the wind. It is only in the final chapters that a real science fiction element enters the story, but this mainly serves as a means for wrapping up the gender study the novel basically consists of.

The story can be confusing at times, and the mixing and confusion of sexual perspectives never truly delivers any revelations of insight. The fact that Fullin, ostensibly a male at this time, is troubled by homosexual feelings from both sides of the gender line, combined with the whole society's antipathy toward Neuts, strikes a discordant chord, and few of Gardner's sexual questions find answers in his strikingly unusual conclusion. Commitment Hour is a strange novel, a book of probing questions without ultimate answers, but such is the very state of society itself. Some readers will no doubt find this novel an uncomfortable read, but its novelty and sense of unusual purpose make of it a story worth pursuing and pondering over.