Customer Reviews

Earthlight

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a very fine novel by Clarke even if some of the science is now out-of-date. The novel is set several centuries in the future. There are essentially two "nations" remaining, Earth (which includes the Moon) and the Triplanetary Federation, which encompasses Mars, Venus, and some of the outer satellites of Jupiter and Saturn. The issue is that in this novel Earth controls most of the solar system's supply of heavy metals e.g. titanium, high-grade iron ore, etc. Therein lies the conflict.
After several centuries of peace, the possibility of war once again looms. Clarke creates the atmosphere for this masterfully.

The story is told from the perspective of an intelligence agent sent from Earth on a counterintelligence mission on the Moon. The storyline does not move at a breakneck pace by any means. Rather, the story moves in a leisurely fashion that gives the reader a fascinating look at what a Moon colony might one day be like. Despite this, the book moves to a climactic ending that is startling and absorbing. This book is an excellent read.

This is a book that might have been made into a movie. Clarke is one of the giants of science fiction. Highly recommended.

Clarke is famous for using a fictional premise as a vehicle for discussing scientific ideas, and rightly so. His ideas are so interesting, and his explanations are so clear that no one minds if the story sometimes takes a back seat to the science. In _Earthlight_, a secret agent visits the lunar colony to find the spy leaking classified material to Earth's other colonies. Clarke uses this premise to explore two main ideas: what life in an established lunar colony would be like, and how a conflict between Earth and her colonies might arise.

Clarke's description of a 200-year-old colony is fascinating. His discussions of the problems created by the hostile lunar environment, and his solutions to them, are clear and interesting. What was surprising to me is that these descriptions, written almost 50 years ago, haven't really dated. There are some anachronisms; all communications are auditory, for example - television wasn't forseen, much less the Internet. But the majority of the ideas are as plausible and compelling as when they were written.

The development of the conflict between the Earth and the Federation of colonies is somewhat less successful. The main reason for the conflict - competition for limited resources - rings true, and Clarke captures the feeling of life during a time of political tension leading to conflict. However, his descriptions of events and motivations feel a little too simple for what we'd expect to be a complex political situation. The concluding battle, employing highly speculative science, is a jarring contrast to the earlier, reasoned discussions of the science behind the lunar colony.

These are nitpicks, however. _Earthlight_ succeeds in the ways most important to Clarke and to his readers. If you're familiar with Clarke's other work, I think you'll enjoy this novel. If you haven't read Clarke before, this novel is a fine introduction, although you would do equally well with his better-known works.

In my opinion, this is easily the best thing Clarke has ever written. It is a little shorter than I would have liked, but its depiction of an interplanetary conflict between old mother Earth and the confederation of once upon a time "colony" planets is very well done. Although interisting and quirky characterizations are not among the reasons this book is good, it does discuss the nature and future of humanity itself, and explores this ambitious theme better than any other author I know of can. The battle at the end between the forces of Earth and the Confederation I thought was very well done. The speculation of the kinds of weapons that would be used were much more realistic or detailed than Star Wars or even other reputable science fiction authors such as Asimov or Heinlein. Definitely a book worth reading for any sci-fi fan.

Earthlight is a good book for anyone who isn't a Clarke fan. It involves a war between Earth and the colonies through the Solar System, and the described battle is not only scientifically accurate (as of its writing) but exciting. It even has what has become a dig at the Lucas-Hollywood style of presenting energy weapons in space. This is a quick read, with believable characters.

Keep in mind that Clark witnessed the Battle of Britain during WW2: He KNOWS what it's like to look up and see an air battle!

I give Earthlight 4 stars, instead of 5, only because scientific knowledge has since made some of Clarke's assumptions obsolete.

I have always loved Clarke's works. It began with 'Expedition to Earth' and there is still a lot to read. I must say I preferred 'Childhood's End' to this book, but this one wasn't dull either. It was fairly straightforward, a book about conflict between Earth and the Federation over resource allocations. The whole story is the usual scientifically-accurate and descriptive science fiction, without any needless drama or extreme grandeur, or wierd aliens. As always, Clarke's books have a certain human quality to them, and are never overtly extravagant. This book is not a must read, but any fan of Clarke's would want to read it.

As other readers have noted, Arthur Clarke is not known for character development. However, his knowledge of science and political savy have made for several compelling reads. "Earthlight" fits this mold. Though not quite on par with his masterworks, it is a very compelling read.

Sadler is sent to the moon for an apparent audit of the activities on the moon. Earthlings have cast their control over the moon, Venus, and Mars in this future time. Much like the present, conflict centers over the use of resources. With the moon both logical midway point and a source of resources, the fight emanates from the moon. Sadler finds himself searching for the "leak" that is exacerbating the tensions. Shunned for being an outsider, Sadler path is rugged but logically plotted.

Clarke is obviously not a mystery writer, so the "leak" is not well hidden. The fact that readers really never get to know other characters does not help foster interest in the mystery. Still, this does not take away from the book. It is intelligently written with a social conscience that still has meaning 50 years after the book was first published. Clarke makes readers feel as though they visited the moon, which may be the highest complement the book can receive.

Earthlight is classic sf from the 50s about a guy going to the moon to try to find a spy in the upcoming war between Earth and the Federation at somewhere around the year 2150.

I had to laugh at one description that had a bunch of women using electric typewriters, and another that had women again entering computer code on punch cards. And those were the only women in the book, other than the protagonist's absent wife.

Kinda sad that this was how he envisioned the future.

I might be one of the few who still remember it - a little! A remarkably realistic - for its 50's time- and restrained, thoughtful drama about moon exploration/colonization. As an early teen reader when it came out, I considered it a little duller than I usually preferred, but I appreciated the scientific integrity - and Clarke is always interesting. It is NOT what is termed "pulp fiction," by the way.

EARTHLIGHT was the third book in a recently published collection of Arthur C. Clarke's early novels called THE SPACE TRILOGY. The other two stories, ISLANDS IN THE SKY (1952) and THE SANDS OF MARS (1951) were good, but most of their appeal is in seeing the type of stories that Clarke was writing at the beginning of his career. They are more curiosities for his hardcore fans than really breathtaking stories in their own right.

Having made my way through those two stories, when I got to EARTHLIGHT I was truly impressed. Despite the 1955 publishing date, EARTHLIGHT feels like Clarke in his prime: able to take the technological progress of the day, extrapolate it out to a story about mankind's fledging space exploration, while still able to focus on (and make interesting) the mundane details that would make space colonization a reality.

One of the most ticklish aspects of the story is that the background involves a space faring human society that is a couple of centuries in our future, but the story's Federation does not include Earth. Instead, the human colonized worlds of Mars, Venus and the moons of Jupiter and Saturn are banding together in an attempt to force Earth to be less stingy about her natural resources. Earth is considering pulling back its support of the Federation, worried about losing resources and intelligent people while receiving nothing tangible in return. The Moon, by reasons of proximity, is still allied to Earth, although many of the scientists of its largely academic population have mixed loyalties.

This last point drives the plot. Sensitive information is being funneled from the Earth to the outer colonies. Our protagonist, Bertram Sadler, is dispatched to the Moon as the research observatories of that satellite have been identified as the most likely conduit. By trade, he's an accountant but he's forced into the role of a counter-spy -- making him one of the few characters in a Clarke novel I've read who isn't a scientist or an astronaut.

While all this spying and counter-spying is going on, the actual story progressing in the background is of the rising tensions between the colonies and their home world. The pressure eventually reaches a boiling point resulting in the only action sequence that I can remember reading in an Arthur C. Clarke story.

EARTHLIGHT does a lot of Clarkeian things, and does them very well. The opening passage is of the protagonist taking a train-ride on the moon, giving Clarke is usual opportunity to speculate about future Moon travel, Moon bases and Moon life. The geopolitical (or is that solarpolitical?) machinations reminded me a lot of aspects of his 2001 series of novels. The lunar-based researcher characters are straight out of virtually every book Clarke ever wrote.

The novel's themes are also familiar, but still they are welcome. The futility (and inevitability) of war. The unabashedly pro-science agenda. There is also a brief discussion on European-style colonialism which parallels the situation Earth finds itself in. It is a somewhat unavoidable theme given the subject matter, but one which becomes more interesting when one thinks about what was going on in the real world when Clarke was putting these words to paper.

The appeal of this novel is not that seeking out this somewhat obscure member of his oeuvre will result in seeing something that you haven't seen from Clarke before, rather it is seeing those familiar pieces put together to form a seriously good book.

In many ways, Arthur Clarke was one of the most visionary of science fiction writers; it is accurate to refer to him as a futurist. In this book, he describes the consequences of the movement of humanity out from Earth to colonize the planets. There is a large lunar colony and it is politically tied to Earth. The scenario is that there is very little in the way of heavy metal resources available on the colonized planets, so they are dependent on supplies from Earth. This has caused a shortage of these metals to appear on Earth and tensions between Earth and the conglomeration of other planets called the Federation are rising. While people are hopeful, it appears that war is inevitable.
The main character is a man named Sadler, whose overt profession is that of an accountant but whose real mission is to discover a spy in an astronomical observatory on the Moon. Someone there is passing information on to the Federation and no one can determine who it is or how it is being done. Although Sadler is unable to determine who the spy is, the real interest the story generates is in Clarke's descriptions of how the Moon colony operates and the political problems between the planets. He uses as his model the social and political problems that led to the American Revolutionary War against Great Britain.
Even though there is an interplanetary war, there is a satisfying and happy ending, for while the war is fought with powerful weapons, it is extremely localized and there is no deliberate targeting of non-military targets. Once both sides understand that victory is unlikely, they patch together an effective peace treaty and at the end, Sadler is talking amiably with his former adversary.
An example of Clarke at his best, this is a story about interplanetary war that ends on a positive note. As always, Clarke never ventures far from the hard reality of physics and his treatment of political problems is completely realistic and perhaps even likely.