Customer Reviews

Cycle of Fire

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This is an old style science fiction novel in the old sense. A stranded earthman, a native of the planet trying to make it back to safety before the planet goest through a massive change in temperature which will, as far as we know, kill every living thing on the planet. The native and the Earthman develop a friendship against the background of struggling against time. The interesting subplot about the planets odd cycle and the evolutionary diversions it had caused was interesting. When at first one of the planetary scientists heats up a sample terrarium full of native plants, animals and dirt, only to watch them wither and die while at the same time tiny new creatures obviously built for the heat emerge from under the soil was an interesting way to start this section of the novel.
If you are interested in a nice read without a lot of the unecessary bells an whistles many authors are fond of putting in you will enjoy this one.

When I spoke to Hal, we discussed this book before he autographed it for me. It was an opportunity to meet an author who had stayed a normal guy, and not been exalted to the Grand Master status that many of his contemparies had achieved.

Cycle of Fire is a simple novel of cooperation between two stranded aliens. It is a buddy novel that has been written before and since in a number of genres.

If you liked Enemy Mine, but not the war overtones, than this is the novel you will probably like better.

Picked this novel up at a used bookstore for $1. Not one of Clement's best, but still entertaining and interesting in terms of its depiction of the two central characters (one human, one alien) and how they interact while stranded on an unusual planet. Typical of Clement, there are detailed descriptions of the planetary system, the two suns, how they influence the "cycle" of hot/cold weather, and the evolution of the unusual life forms found therein. Rather atypical for science fiction, there is no real violence or sex or technological wizardry to speak of. Hence, a somewhat old-fashioned, 1950s-style science fiction tale reminiscent of something that Asimov (a great admirer of Clement) or Bradbury might have written.